LITERATURE  AND  LIFE. 


BY 


EDWLN"   P.   WHIPPLE, 


ENLARGED   EDITION. 


BOSTON: 
JAMES   R.    OSGOOD  AND   COMPANY, 

LATE  TICKNOR  &  FIELDS,  AND  FIELDS,  OSGOOD,  &  Co. 

1871. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1849, 

BY   '13.     P.     WHIFFLE, 
in  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  District  of  Massachusetts 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1871, 

BY    E.     P.    WHIFFLE, 
in  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington. 


UNIVERSITY  PRESS  :  WELCH,  BIGELOW,  &  Co., 
CAMBRIDGE. 


Page 

AUTHORS  IN  THEIR  RELATIONS  TO  LIFE        ...  7 

NOVEL&.-AND  NOVELISTS.  —  CHARLES  DICKENS  .        .  42 

WIT  AND  HUMOR 84 

THE  LUDICROUS  SIDE  OF  LIFE 122 

.GENIUS 156 

INTELLECTUAL  HEALTH  AND  DISEASE        .        .        .  186 

USE  AND  MISUSE  OF  WORDS 219 

WORDSWORTH     .        . 253 

BRYANT  .                303 

STUPID  CONSERVATISM  AND  MALIGNANT  REFORM  322 


AUTHOES    IN   THEIE   EELATIONS   TO 
LIFE* 


THERE  has  existed  in  all  ages  a  class  of  men,  called  at 
different  periods  by  different  names,  but  generally  com- 
prehended under  the  name  of  authors.  They  hold  the 
same  relation  to  the  mind  of  man  that  the  agriculturist 
and  manufacturer  bear  to  his  body ;  and  by  virtue  of 
their  sway  over  the  realms  of  thought  and  emotion,  they 
have  exercised  a  vast  influence  upon  human  affairs, 
which  has  too  often  been  overlooked  or  denied  by  earth's 
industrial  and  political  sovereigns.  Operating  as  they 
do  on  unseen  substances,  and  working  silent  and  mys- 
terious changes  in  the  inward  man,  without  altering 
his  external  aspect,  they  have  strangely  puzzled  the 
whole  horde  of  bigots  and  tyrants,  and  have  written  their 
Mene,  Mene,  Tekel,  Upharsin  on  the  walls  of  earth's 
proudest  palaces.  On  the  occasion  of  a  literary  anni- 
versary like  yours,  I  am  aware  of  no  more  appropriate 

*  Delivered  before  the  Literary  Societies  of  Brown  University, 
Sept.  1,  1846. 


<3  AUTHORS. 

subject,  —  none  which  is  more  likely  to  bear,  remotely 
or  immediately,  on  your  own  future  pursuits  and  profes- 
sions, —  than  this  of  Authors ;  and  in  tracing  out  some 
of  their  relations  to  life,  I  think  I  can  inflict  less  tedious- 
ness  upon  you  than  if  I  had  selected  some  topic  with  a 
more  resounding  name,  and  admitting  of  more  ambitious 
disquisition.  My  object  will  be  to  set  forth  their  moral 
and  intellectual  influence,  the  physical  necessities  which 
have  modified  the  direction  of  their  powers,  and  the  dis- 
crepancies observable  between  their  internal  and  external 
existence.  This  will  involve  a  consideration  of  their 
relations  to  their  age,  to  booksellers,  and  to  domestic  and 
social  life.  You  must  pardon  the  remediless  superficial- 
ity of  my  view,  as  each  division  might  well  exhaust  a 
volume. 

And  first,  let  us  refer  to  the  influence  of  authors,  and 
the  position  they  have  occupied  in  the  world. 

Without  taking  into  view  the  lives  and  thoughts  of 
authors,  history  becomes  an  enigma,  or  a  many-volumed 
lie.  We  read  of  wars,  crusades,  persecutions,  ameliora- 
tions, of  mighty  and  convulsive  changes  in  opinions  and 
manners,  without  obtaining  any  clue  to  the  real  causes 
of  events,  any  insight  into  the  laws  of  God's  providence. 
Without  inweaving  literary  into  civil  history,  we  gain  no 
knowledge  of  the  annals  of  human  nature.  We  have 
the  body  of  history  without  the  soul,  —  events  without 


AUTHORS  9 

ideas,  —  effects  without  causes,  —  the  very  atheism  of 
narrative.  The  abridgments  we  study  at  schools  are 
commonly  made  up  of  incidents  jumbled  together  like 
beads,  and  unconnected  by  any  thread  of  reason  and 
reality.  It  is  hardly  possible  for  a  boy,  studying  these 
works,  to  grasp  any  other  idea  of  man  than  the  idea  of 
a  being  with  legs,  arms,  and  appetites. 

Now  it  is  a  fact  that  Thought,  true  or  false,  bene- 
ficial or  pernicious,  has  borne  the  sceptre  of  influence 
irt  this  world's  affairs.  Impulse,  whim  and  chance,  have 
not  been  the  blind  guides  of  the  generations  of  men. 
Above  all  the  fret  and  tumult  of  active  existence,  above 
the  decrees  of  earth's  nominal  sovereigns,  above  all  the 
violence  and  evil  which  render  what  is  called  history  so 
black  a  record  of  folly  and  crime  —  above  all  these,  there 
have  ever  been  certain  luminous  ideas,  pillars  of  fire  in 
the  night  of  time,  which  have  guided  and  guarded  the 
great  army  of  humanity,  in  its  slow  and  hesitating,  but 
still  onward,  progress  in  knowledge  and  freedom.  It  is 
not  the  ruler  that  makes  the  most  noise  in  the  world,  that 
most  shapes  the  world's  fortunes.  Ten  rockets,  sent  vio- 
lently into  the  air,  by  their  blaze  and  impotent  fury, 
attract  all  eyes,  and  seem  much  finer  and  grander  than 
the  eternal  stars ;  but  after  their  short  and  rushing  life 
has  burnt  out,  and  they  have  noised  themselves  into 
nothingness,  the  stars  still  shine  serenely  on,  and  seem 


10  AUTHORS. 

almost  to  look  down  with  contempt  on  the  crowd  who 
have  been  fooled  into  fear  or  admiration.  Thus  is  it  in 
history.  The  being  to  whose  commands  is  given  a  brief 
omnipotence,  —  whose  single  word  moves  myriads  of 
men,  —  on  whom  power  and  glory  are  lavished  without 
measure,  —  is  often  but  the  mere  instrument  of  some 
idea  or  principle,  mightier  than  he ;  and  to  find  his  mas- 
ter and  king,  we  must  travel  back  years,  and  perhaps 
ages,  and  seek  him  in  the  lonely  cell  of  some  poor  and 
despised  student,  whose  busy  brain  is  shaping  in  silence 
those  immaterial  substances,  destined  to  shake  the  world; 
to  fall  like  fire  upon  the  hearts  of  men,  and  kindle  in 
them  new  life  and  energy ;  to  overthrow  and  to  rebuild 
thrones :  to  be  the  roots  of  new  moral  and  intellectual 
dynasties;  and,  keeping  their  way  through  generation 
after  generation,  to  come  out  in  the  end  gloriously  or  in- 
famously, according  as  they  are  founded  in  justice  and 
truth,  or  falsehood  and  wrong.  Thus  the  thinker  ever 
precedes  the  actor.  Thoughts  ever  have  to  battle  them- 
selves into  institutions.  The  passage  of  a  paradox  into 
a  truism  is  attended  with  numberless  commotions.  With 
these  commotions,  rather  than  with  the  ideas  and  feel- 
ings whence  they  spring,  history  has  chiefly  chosen  to 
deal ;  and  it  rarely  notices  the  ten  thousand  agencies 
operating  on  a  nation's  mind,  until  revolutions  have 
passed  from  thoughts  into  facts,  and  made  themselves 


AUTHORS.  11 

Known  on  fields  of  stricken  battle.  Every  great  origin- 
ating mind  produces  in  some  way  a  change  in  society ; 
every  great  originating  mind  whose  exercise  is  controlled 
by  duty,  effects  a  beneficial  change.  This  effect  may  be 
immediate,  may  be  remote.  A  nation  may  be  in  a  tumult 
to-day,  for  a  thought  which  the  timid  Erasmus  placidly 
penned  in  his  study  more  than  two  centuries  ago. 
Thought  may  be  first  written  in  an  unintelligible  jargon, 
in  Benthamese  or  Kantese,  for  instance;  but  every  Ben- 
tbam  finds  his  Dumont,  and  every  Kant  his  Cousin.  An 
author  may  affect  his  race  through  conductors.  He  may 
be  mysterious ;  others  will  translate  him  to  the  people. 
He  may  be  a  coward ;  others  will  do  the  fighting.  He 
may  be  a  wretch,  studious  of  infamy ;  Humanity  takes 
the  thought,  and  spurns  the  man.  Many  poets  who  have 
led  lives  of  luxury  and  effeminacy,  and  sat  honored 
guests  at  the  tables  of  tyrants,  have  still  exalted  our  con- 
ceptions of  intellectual  excellence,  refined  our  manners, 
extended  the  range  of  our  sympathies.  They  have  mod- 
ified the  institutions  of  society  by  modifying  the  mental 
character  of  society,  of  which  institutions  are  the  out- 
ward expression.  A  change  in  thought  or  prejudice 
works  out,  in  the  end,  a  change  in  governments  and 
laws.  "  Beware,"  says  a  brilliant  essayist,  "  when  the 
great  God  lets  loose  a  thinker  on  this  planet.  Then  all 
things  are  at  risk." 


12  AUTHORS. 

Authors  are  thus  entitled  to  a  prominent  rank  among 
the  producing  classes,  and  their  lives  deserve  a  more 
intelligent  scrutiny  from  the  practical  men  who  stigma- 
tize them  as  dreamers.  Their  importance  has  rarely 
been  correctly  estimated,  either  in  summing  up  a  na- 
tion's wealth  or  a  nation's  dangers.  Society  has  played 
with  them  its  most  capricious  game  of  coquetry.  The 
same  generation  which  neglects  or  tortures  a  man  of 
letters,  will  often  supply  a  whole  army  of  admiring  com- 
mentators to  distort  his  works. 

"Ten  ancient  towns  contend  for  Homer  dead, 
Through  which  the  living  Homer  begged  his  bread." 

No  language  can  fitly  express  the  meanness,  the  base- 
ness, the  brutality,  with  which  the  world  has  ever  treated 
its  victims  of  one  age  and  boasts  of  the  next.  Dante  is 
worshipped  at  that  grave  to  which  he  was  hurried  by 
persecution.  Milton,  in  his  own  day,  was  "  Mr.  Milton, 
the  blind  adder,  that  spit  his  venom  on  the  king's  per- 
son ;"  and  soon  after,  "  the  mighty  orb  of  song."  These 
absurd  transitions  from  hatred  to  apotheosis,  this  recogni- 
tion just  at  the  moment  when  it  becomes  a  mockery, 
sadden  all  intellectual  history.  Is  it  not  strange  that 
the  biography  of  authors  should  be  so  steeped  in  misery, 
—  that  while  exercising  the  most  despotic  dominion 
that  man  can  wield  over  the  fortunes  of  his  race, 
their  own  lives  should  so  often  present  a  melancholy 


AUTHORS.  13 

spectacle  of  unrest,  unhappmess,  frailty,  beggary,  and 
despair  ? 

What  has  been  the  fate  of  those  who  have  striven 
hard  to  bring  the  actual  world  nearer  to  ideal  perfection  ? 
Has  not  fidelity  to  ideas,  the  exercise  of  moral  courage 
in  the  cause  of  truth,  when  it  could  not  be  pensioned 
into  apostacy,  been  too  often  rewarded  with  persecution 
into  heaven  ?  The  cold,  lifeless  axiom,  so  inoffensively 
ineffective,  and  so  securely  announced  from  the  dull  soul 
of  the  pedant — how  has  it  been,  when  it  came  hissing  hot 
from  the  gushing  heart  of  genius,  tearing  and  ripping  up 
the  surface  concealments  of  tolerated  sins  ?  Wherever  a 
great  soul  has  raised  the  banner  of  revolt  against  accred- 
ited fraud  or  honored  duncery,  thither  has  flown  Igno- 
rance with  her  bats  and  owls,  thither  has  sped  Power  with 
his  racks  and  gibbets.  Do  you  wonder  that  so  much  of 
the  world's  intellect  has  been  chained,  like  a  galley- 
slave,  to  the  world's  corruptions,  when  you  find  its  free 
and  honest  exercise  so  often  thus  rewarded  with  poverty 
or  death  ? 

Time,  to  be  sure,  that  consecrates  all  things,  conse- 
crates even  the  lives  of  authors.  When  the  great  man 
is  laid  in  his  grave,  lies  of  malice  are  apt  to  give  way  to 
lies  of  adulation.  Men  feel  his  genius  more,  and  his 
faults  less.  The  cry  then  is,  to  bury  the  evil  he  has 
done  with  his  bones,  —  to  forbear  dragging  his  frailties 


14  AUTHORS. 

from  their  dread  abode.  Then  steps  forth  a  debonair 
biographer,  to  varnish  his  errors  or  crimes,  in  order  that 
he  may  appear  respectably  before  that  dear  public  whose 
stupidity  or  caprice  may  have  urged  him  to  their  com- 
mission. It  is  well,  after  calumny  has  feasted  and 
fattened  on  his  name,  that  he  should  undergo  the  solemn 
foolery  of  a  verbal  beatitude  !  Indeed,  it  seems  strange, 
that  the  old  maxim  declaring  no  human  being  to  have 
arrived  at  perfection  on  earth  should  still  be  heard  from 
the  pulpit,  when  even  every  newspaper  obituary  gives 
it  the  lie  ! 

There  is,  indeed,  a  natural  disposition  with  us  to  judge 
an  author's  personal  character  by  the  character  of  his 
works.  We  find  it  difficult  to  understand  the  common 
antithesis  of  a  good  writer  and  a  bad  man.  We  dislike 
to  believe  that  any  of  those  gifted  beings  who  have  been 
the  choicest  companions  of  our  best  and  happiest  hours, 
who  have  kindled  or  exalted  our  love  of  the  beautiful  and 
good,  who  have  given  us  knowledge  and  power,  and 
whose  words  rebuke  us  for  our  own  moral  as  well  as 
mental  inferiority,  should  have  ugly  spots  of  meanness 
or  baseness  blotting  their  bright  escutcheons.  We  in- 
stinctively lend  a  greedy  ear  to  the  weakest  apologies 
offered  in  behalf  of  our  favorites,  and  side  with  them 
against  any  who  may  have  been  their  adversaries  or 
victims.  The  greater  the  writer,  the  more  pertinaciously 


AUTHORS.  15 

we  sophisticate  away  the  faults  of  the  man.  We  side 
with  Pope  in  his  quarrel  with  Gibber,  with  Addison  in 
his  quarrel  with  Steele.  We  give  little  credence  to  the 
fact  that  Bacon  took  bribes,  or  that  Byron  took  gin.  No 
notoriety  given  to  Campbell's  vices  can  make  us  believe 
the  creator  of  Gertrude,  envious,  malignant  and  sottish. 
Let  mediocrity  commit  similar,  faults  to  those  we  pardon 
in  genius,  and  we  should  hurl  at  it  our  loudest  thunders 
of  rebuke.  Forgetting  that  writers  are  men,  exposed  to 
more  than  common  trials  and  temptations,  we  fondly 
believe  their  external  life  always  in  harmony  with  theii 
internal  ideals.  A  little  reflection  teaches  us  that  the 
truisms  of  thought  are  the  paradoxes  of  action.  If  this 
be  true,  then  the  ideals  of  thought  may  be  almost  classed 
among  the  prodigies  of  conduct;  and  in  literature  we 
must  often  be  indebted  for  priceless  benefits  to  men 
personally  unworthy  of  our  esteem ;  to  have  our  cour- 
age kindled  by  the  oratory  of  cowards ;  our  confidence 
in  virtue  strengthened  by  the  poetry  of  debauchees ;  and 
our  loftiest  sentiments  of  liberty  and  disinterestedness 
ennobled  by  imaginations  shaped  by  the  servile  and  the 
mean. 

To  reconcile  this  monstrous  anomaly  with  nature,  WP 
must  recollect  two  things :  first,  that  the  possession  of 
great  energies  of  mind  does  not  suppose  the  absence  of 
bad  passions;  and  second,  that  authors  are  compelled, 


16  AUTHORS. 

like  other  men,  to  labor  for  a  subsistence.  In  some  cases, 
it  is  true,  the  man  of  genius  is  blasted  from  within ;  his 
genius  becoming  the  slave  of  unbitted  passions  and 
satanic  pride.  Thus  Campbell  compared  the  unwearied 
fire  that  burned  in  the  breast  of  Byron  to  the  "  robe  and 
golden  crown  which  Medea,  in  Euripides,  sends  Glauce, 
the  wife  of  Jason ;  their  beauty  and  magic  loveliness  did 
not  prevent  them  from  consuming  to  ashes  the  victim 
whom  they  so  gorgeously  adorned."  In  some  cases,  too, 
the  lust  of  the  intellect  has  been  stronger  than  the  lust 
of  the  flesh,  and  put  iron  wills  into  evil  hearts, 

"  Whose  steep  aim 

Was,  Titan-like,  on  daring  doubts  to  pile 
Thoughts  which  should  draw  down  thunder,  and  the  flame 
Of  heaven." 

But  poverty,  perhaps,  has  been  the  most  fertile  source 
of  literary  crimes.  Men  of  letters  have  ever  displayed 
the  same  strange  indisposition  to  starve  common  to  other 
descendants  of  Adam.  The  law  of  supply  and  demand 
operates  in  literature  as  in  trade.  For  instance,  if  a 
poor  poet,  rich  only  in  the  riches  of  thought,  be  placed  in 
an  age  which  demands  intellectual  monstrosities,  he  is 
tempted  to  pervert  his  powers  to  please  the  general  taste. 
This  he  must  do  or  die,  and  this  he  should  rather  die 
than  do ;  but  still,  if  he  hopes  to  live  by  his  products,  he 
must  produce  what  people  will  buy,  —  and  it  is  already 


AUTHORS.  17 

supposed  that  nothing  will  be  bought  except  what  is 
brainless  or  debasing.  The  opposite  of  this  is  likewise 
true.  If  a  man  of  mental  power  and  moral  weakness  be 
placed  in  an  age  which  demands  purity  in  its  literature, 
his  writings  may  exhibit  a  seraphical  aspect,  while  his 
life  is  stained  with  folly  and  wickedness.  Thus  it  is 
that  many  writers  who  have  lived  decently  good  lives 
have  written  indecently  bad  works ;  and  many  who  have 
lived  ^indecently  bad  lives  have  written  decently  good 
works ;  and  the  solution  of  the  mystery  lies  not  in  the 
brain,  but  in  the  physical  necessities,  of  the  man.  Poets 
are  by  no  means  wingless  angels,  fed  with  ambrosia 
plucked  from  Olympus,  or  manna  rained  down  from 
heaven. 

This  brings  us  to  one  great  division  in  every  author's 
life,  —  his  relation  to  the  public.  This  can  be  best  illus- 
trated by  a  pertinent  example  from  a  corrupt  age.  John 
Dryden  had  a  clear  perception  of  moral  truth,  and  no 
natural  desire  to  injure  his  species.  He  was  an  eminent 
professional  author  during  the  reign  of  Charles  II.  The 
time  in  which  he  lived  was  one  of  great  depravity  of  taste, 
and  greater  depravity  of  manners.  Authors  seemed 
banded  in  an  insane  crusade  to  exalt  blasphemy  and 
profligacy  to  the  vacant  throne  of  piety  and  virtue. 
Books  were  valuable  according  to  the  wickedness  blended 
with  their  talent.  Mental  power  was  lucrative  only  in 
2 


18  AUTHORS. 

its  perversion.  The  public  was  ravenous  for  the  witty 
iniquities  of  the  brain ;  •  and,  to  use  the  energetic  invec- 
tive of  South,  laid  hold  of  brilliant  morsels  of  sin,  with 
"fire  and  brimstone  flaming  round  them,  and  thus,  as 
it  were,  digested  death  itself,  and  made  a  meal  upon  per- 
dition" Now,  it  is  evident,  in  such  a  period  as  this,  a 
needy  author  was  compelled  to  choose  between  virtue 
attended  by  neglect,  and  vice  lackeyed  by  popularity. 
One  of  Sir  Charles  Sedley's  profligate  comedies,  one  of 
Lord  Rochester's  ribald  lampoons,  possessed  more  mer- 
cantile value  than  the  Paradise  Lost.  In  such  a  period 
as  this,  the  poet  should  have  descended  upon  his  time, 
like  Schiller's  ideal  artist,  "not  to  delight  it  with  his  pres- 
ence, but  terrible,  like  the  son  of  Agamemnon,  to  purify 
it."  Dryden  was  placed  in  this  age,  and,  for  a  long  period 
of  his  life,  was  its  pander  and  parasite.  The  author 
of  Alexander's  Feast  condescended  to  write  comedies 
whose  ferocious  licentiousness  astounds  and  bewilders 
the  modern  reader.  Yet,  had  he  lived  in  the  reign  of 
George  III.,  he  would  not  have  been  more  immoral  than 
Churchill;  had  he  lived  in  our  day,  his  muse  would 
have  been  as  pure  as  that  of  Campbell.  He  could  not, 
or  would  not,  learn  that  it  is  better  to  starve  on  honesty 
than  thrive  on  baseness.  "It  is  hard,"  says  an  old 
English  divine,  "  to  maintain  truth,  but  still  harder  to 
be  maintained  by  it." 


AUTHORS.  19 

Now  this  mercantile  or  economical  element,  this  dispo- 
sition to  let  out  talent  as  a  jaded  hack  in  the  service  of 
Satan,  when  Satan  pays  the  price,  looks  out  upon  us  con- 
stantly from  literary  history.  In  this  connection  it  would 
be  unjust  not  to  pay  a  passing  tribute  to  that  long-eared 
wisdom  which  obtains  in  our  country,  of  starving  authors 
down  into  despair  in  order  that  they  may  be  lifted  thence 
by  sin  —  that  sagacious  philosophy  which  sees  no  danger 
inr  neglecting  a  poor  novelist  or  poet,  and  then  contrives 
to  be  astonished  at  the  ability  displayed  in  an  atheistic 
pamphlet  or  an  agrarian  harangue.  The  merchant,  who 
sneers  at  literary  pursuits,  shuts  his  purse  when  a  new 
volume  appears,  and  clamors  for  the  protection  of  all 
manufactures  but  those  of  the  mind,  might,  perhaps, 
if  he  were  logically  inclined,  trace  some  connection  be- 
tween his  foolish  illiberality  and  a  financial  storm  which 
stripped  him  of  half  his  fortune,  or  a  quack  medicine 
which  poisoned  his  wife,  or  a  bad  book  which  ruined  the 
morals  of  his  son.  It  is  this  senseless  and  disgraceful 
contempt  for  the  power  of  authors  which  causes  much 
of  the  perversion  of  talent  so  common  in  our  day.  Let 
us  suppose  the  case  of  a  man  who,  led  by  some  inscruta- 
ble invvard  impulse,  adopts  the  profession  of  American 
authorship.  Of  course,  this  act  would  furnish  indubi- 
table proof  of  insanity  in  any  candid  court  of  justice ;  but 
waiving  that  consideration,  let  us  hear  the  advice  given 


20  AUTHORS. 

to  him  after  his  first  book  has  gone  the  way  of  the  trunk- 
maker's,  after  a  sale  of  ten  copies.  He  is  told  that  he 
made  a  mistake  in  the  selection  of  his  subject;  that 
the  people  want  something  in  the  "  flash  line."  It  is 
well  for  him  if  he  can  reconcile  the  flash  line  with  the 
line  of  duty.  However,  he  proceeds  in  his  course,  until 
all  notion  of  the  dignity  of  authorship  vanishes  from  his 
mind.  Literature,  to  him,  is  the  manufacture  of  ephem- 
eral inanities  and  monstrous  depravities,  to  serve  as  food 
for  fools  and  vagabonds.  He  is  ready  to  write  on  any 
subject  which  will  afford  him  bread,  —  moral  or  immoral, 
religious  or  atheistic,  solid  or  flash.  He  lets  out  his  pen 
to  the  highest  bidder,  as  Captain  Dalgetty  let  out  his 
sword.  You  may  hire  him  to  write  transcendentalism ; 
you  may  hire  him  to  write  brain-sick  stories  for  namby- 
pamby  magazines;  you  may  hire  him  to  write  quack 
advertisements.  And  this  is  a  successor  of  John  Milton, 
—  as  Pope  Joan  was  a  successor  of  Saint  Peter !  But 
where  lies  the  blame?  The  "respectable"  portion  of 
society  aver  that  the  blame  lies  in  the  author ;  reason 
seems  to  assert  that  the  blame  lies  in  the  "  respectable  " 
portion  of  society. 

Indeed,  it  seems  impossible  for  men  to  realize  the  im- 
portance and  influence  of  authors,  as  purifiers  or  poison- 
ers of  the  public  taste  and  morals.  For  evil  or  good, 
they  exercise  a  vast  and  momentous  dominion.  But 


AUTHORS.  21 

they  are  not  generally  men  distinguished  from  Dther  men 
by  superior  strength  of  principle.  If  neglected  and 
despised,  they  teach  the  lesson,  that  if  virtue  and  truth 
decline  paying  wages  to  talent,  falsehood  and  profligacy 
are  not  so  parsimonious. 

Burke,  no  superficial  reader  of  men  and  books,  says, 
in  one  of  his  immortal  pamphlets,  that  "  he  can  form  a 
tolerably  correct  estimate  of  what  is  likely  to  happen  in 
a  character  chiefly  dependent  for  fame  and  fortune  on 
knowledge  and  talent,  both  in  its  morbid  and  perverted 
state,  and  in  that  which  is  sound  and  natural.  Natu- 
rally, such  men  are  the  first  gifts  of  Providence  to  the 
world.  But  when  they  have  once  cast  off  the  fear  of 
God,  which  in  all  ages  has  been  too  often  the  case,  and 
the  fear  of  man,  which  is  now  the  case ;  and  when,  in 
that  state,  they  come  to  understand  one  another,  and  to 
act  in  corps,  a  more  fearful  calamity  cannot  arise  out  of 
hell  to  scourge  mankind."  Now,  whether  American 
authors  are  to  be  scourges  or  blessings  rests  with 
those  who  are  to  be  injured  or  benefited.  But  one 
thing  is  certain,  that  social  order,  good  government, 
correct  morals,  cannot  long  be  preserved  after  well- 
fed  and  well-principled  mediocrity  has  divorced  itself 
from  ill-fed  and  loose-principled  talent.  And  it  is  per- 
fectly right  that  it  should  be  so.  It  is  according  to  the 
heaven-ordained  constitution  of  things.  A  nation  which 


22  AUTHORS. 

places  implicit  reliance  on  steam-engines  and  mill-privi- 
leges will  find  that  in  all  that  affects  the  weal  or  woe  of 
communities  mind-power  is  greater  than  steam-power, 
— a  truth  which  should  be  held  up  in  the  faces  of  our 
shrewd  and  prudent  worldlings,  till,  like  the  poet's  mirror 
of  diamond,  "  it  dazzle  and  pierce  their  misty  eye-balls." 
It  is  doubtless  very  pleasant,  and  very  agreeable,  to  shoot 
out  the  tongue  at  the  mere  mention  of  a  national  litera- 
ture, to  belittle  and  degrade  the  occupation  of  letters ;  but 
let  those  complacent  gentlemen  who  practise  the  jest  look 
to  it  that  the  sparks  they  would  trample  under  foot  fly 
not  up  in  their  own  faces.  "  Literature,"  said  Mr.  Pitt  to 
Robert  Southey,  "  will  take  care  of  itself." — "  Yes,"  was 
the  reply,  "  and  take  care  of  you  too,  if  you  do  not  see 
to  it." 

But  there  is  a  class  of  authors  different  from  those, 
who  cringe  to  prevalent  tastes,  and  pander  to  degrading 
passions ;  men  whom  neither  power  can  intimidate,  nor 
flattery  deceive,  nor  wealth  corrupt;  the  heroes  of  intel- 
lectual history,  who  combine  the  martyr's  courage  with 
the  poet's  genius,  and  who,  in  the  strength  of  their  fixed 
wills  and  free  hearts,  might  have  scoffed  as  divinely  at 
the  threats  of  earth-born  power  as  the  Virgin  Martyr  of 
Massinger  at  the  torturers  of  Diocletian  and  Maximi- 
nua:  — 


AUTHORS.  23 

"  The  visage  of  the  hangman  frights  not  me ! 
The  sight  of  whips,  racks,  gibbets,  axes,  fires, 
Are  scaffoldings  on  which  my  soul  climbs  up 
To  an  eternal  habitation." 

This  class,  it  must  be  confessed,  is  small.  It  does  not 
include  many  men  of  unquestioned  genius.  It  does  not 
include  many  whose  works  will  be  read  and  loved  forever. 
But  such  an  one  was  Dante,  to  whose  raised  spirit, 
even  in  this  life,  the  world  had  passed  away.  Such  was 
Schiller,  toiling  for  twenty  years  up  the  topless  pinnacle 
of  thought,  unconquered  by  constant  physical  pain,  his 
upward  eye  ever  fixed  on  his  receding  ideal.  Such  was 
Shelley,  who  made  his  stricken  life,  with  all  its  stern 
agonies  and  cruel  disappointments, 

"  A  doom 
As  glorious  as  a  fiery  martyrdom." 

Such  was  "Wordsworth,  unmoved  by  ridicule  and  neglect 
calmly  writing  poems  for  another  generation  to  read. 
And  such,  above  all,  was  Milton.  No  eulogy,  though 
carved  in  marble,  can  rightly  celebrate  his  character  and 
genius : — 

"  Nothing  can  cover  his  high  fame,  but  Heaven ; 
No  monument  set  off  his  memories, 
But  the  eternal  substance  of  his  greatness." 

The  austere  grandeur  of  his  life  may  well  excite  the 
wonder  of  the  traders,  panders  and  parasites  of  literature. 
His  patience  and  conscience  were  tried  by  all  the  calami- 


24  AUTHORS. 

ties  which  break  down  the  spirits  of  common  men,  —  by 
sickness,  by  blindness,  by  poverty,  by  the  ingratitude  of 
his  children,  by  the  hatred  of  the  powerful,  by  the  malice 
of  the  base.  But  the  might  of  his  moral  nature  overcame 
them  all.  No  one  can  fitly  reverence  Milton  who  has  not 
studied  the  character  of  the  age  of  Charles  II.,  in  which 
his  later  fortunes  were  cast.  He  was  Dryden's  contem- 
porary in  time,  but  not  his  master  or  disciple  in  slavish- 
ness.  He  was  under  the  anathema  of  power :  a  repub- 
lican, in  days  of  abject  servility ;  a  Christian,  among  men 
whom  it  would  be  charity  to  call  infidels ;  a  man  of  pure 
life  and  high  principle,  among  sensualists  and  rene- 
gades. On  nothing  external  could  he  lean  for  support. 
In  his  own  domain  of  imagination  perhaps  the  greatest 
poet  that  ever  lived,  he  was  still  doomed  to  see  such 
pitiful  and  stupid  poetasters  as  Shadwell  and  Settle 
bear  away  the  shining  rewards  of  letters.  "Well  might 
he  declare  that  he  had  fallen  on  evil  times !  He  was 
among  his  opposites,  —  a  despised  and  high-souled  Puri^ 
tan-poet,  surrounded  by  a  horde  of  desperate  and  disso- 
lute scribblers,  who  can  be  compared,  as  an  accomplished 
critic  has  eloquently  said,  "to  nothing  so  fitly  as  the 
rabble  in  Comus,  grotesque  monsters,  half  bestial, 
half  human,  dropping  with  wine,  bloated  with  glut- 
tony, reeling  in  obscene  dances.  Amidst  these  his 
muse  was  placed,  like  the  chaste  lady  of  the  masque, 


AUTHORS.  25 

lofty,  spotless  and  serene,  —  to  be  chattered  at,  and 
pointed  at,  and  grinned  at,  by  the  whole  rabble  of  satyrs 
and  goblins."  Yet,  from  among  such  base  environ- 
ments, did  Milton  "  soar  in  the  high  reason  of  his  fan- 
cies, with  his  garland  and  singing  robes  about  him;" 
and  while  suffering  the  bitterest  penalties  of  honesty  and 
genius,  in  that  age  of  shallow  wit  and  profound  villany, 
his  soul  never  ceased  to  glow  with  the  grandeur  of 
that  earlier  day,  when  he  had  stood  forth  foremost 
amoilg  the  champions  of  truth,  and  like  his  own  invinci- 
ble warrior,  ZEAL,  "  a  spirit  of  the  largest  size  and 
divinest  mettle,"  had  driven  his  fiery  chariot  over  the 
heads  of  "  scarlet  prelates,"  "  bruising  their  stiff  necks 
under  his  flaming  wheels."  The  genius  of  Milton  is 
indeed  worthy  all  the  admiration  we  award  marvellous 
intellectual  endowment ;  but  how  much  more  do  we  ven- 
erate the  whole  man,  when  we  find  it  riveted  to  that  high 
and  hardy  moral  courage  which  makes  his  name  thunder 
rebuke  to  all  power  that  betrays  freedom,  to  all  genius 
that  is  false  to  virtue !  Dante,  Schiller,  Shelley,  Milton, 
—  poets,  heroes,  martyrs,  —  must  the  mournful  truth  be 
forced  from  our  reluctant  lips,  — 

"  Their  mighty  spirits 
Lie  raked  up  with  their  ashes  hi  their  urns, 
And  not  a  spark  of  their  eternal  fire 
Glows  in  a  present  bosom." 


26  AUTHORS. 

The  relation  of  an  author  to  his  age  is  the  most  impor- 
tant of  his  life.  We  have  seen  what  terrible  temptations 
beset  him  in  this  relation,  —  how  apt  are  his  principles  to 
break  like  bubbles  into  air,  when  tried  by  want  and  oblo- 
quy. But,  perhaps,  with  him  it  is  more  properly  a  rela- 
tion to  his  publisher ;  and  certainly  few  chapters  of  liter- 
ary history  are  more  curious  than  those  relating  to  the 
connection  of  writers  and  booksellers.  In  this  division 
of  his  life,  the  man  of  letters  appears  as  a  man  of  busi- 
ness. No  two  classes  connected  by  ties  of  interest  have 
hated  each  other  more  cordially  than  these ;  and  none 
have  had  more  reason.  It  is  difficult  to  say  which  has 
suffered  most.  The  result  of  all  inquiries  may  be 
summed  up  in  this,  —  that  booksellers  have  realized  for- 
tunes out  of  works  they  purchased  for  a  pittance,  and 
that  on  a  majority  of  published  books  there  has  been  a 
loss.  "Learning,"  pithily  says  old  Dr.  Fuller,  "has 
made  most  by  those  books  on  which  the  printers  have 
lost."  On  one  side,  we  are  told  that  booksellers  are 
grasping  and  knavish;  capitalists  who  loan  money  on 
mortgages  of  brain  and  conscience;  bon-vivants,  who 
drink  their  wine  out  of  authors'  skulls.  That  fine  old 
poet,  Michael  Drayton,  calls  them  "  a  base  company  of 
knaves,  whom  he  scorns  and  kicks  at."  Epithets  as 
contemptuous  swarm  in  all  printed  books.  Indeed,  the 
author  heretofore  has  shown  little  sagacity  in  his  deal- 


AUTHORS.  27 

ings  with  "the  trade."  He  has  sold  his  commodities 
when  spurred  by  pressing  necessities ;  and  it  is  an  uni- 
versal rule,  that  when  the  author  wants  money  the  pub- 
lisher never  wants  books.  No  writer  who  does  not 
desire  to  end  his  life  in  beggary  and  despair,  should 
ever  treat  with  a  bookseller  when  he  is  dunned  by  a 
washerwoman  or  dogged  by  a  sheriff.  In  the  present 
century,  Scott,  Byron,  Moore,  Mackintosh,  and  Dickens, 
have  shown  in  this  far  more  tact  and  shrewdness  than 
their  brethren  of  fonner  times.  Scott  was  nominally 
paid  nearly  a  million  of  dollars  for  his  works.  Byron 
received  ten  dollars  a  line  for  the  fourth  canto  of  Childe 
Harold.  Moore  obtained  two  thousand  pounds  for  his 
Life  of  Sheridan,  three  thousand  pounds  for  Lalla  Rookh, 
four  thousand  pounds  for  his  Life  of  Byron.  The  list 
might  be  indefinitely  extended.  But,  in  fact,  until  the 
latter  part  of  the  last  century,  the  science  of  book- 
making  and  book-publishing  was  imperfectly  understood. 
The  "  reading  public "  is  a  creation  of  the  last  eighty 
years.  Previously,  writers  depended  for  subsistence 
chiefly  on  the  theatre,  the  patronage  of  the  noble,  the 
favor  of  sects  and  factions.  The  age  of  general  intel- 
ligence, which  makes  the  great  body  of  the  nation  the 
dispensers  of  fame  and  fortune,  had  not  commenced. 
The  work  best  remunerated  during  the  seventeenth  and 
eighteenth  centuries  was  Pope's  translation  of  the  Iliad, 


28  AUTHORS. 

for  which  he  received  about  five  thousand  three  hun- 
dred pounds.  Most  of  Pope's  contemporaries  were  but 
poorly  paid  for  their  literary  tasks,  and  he  himself  re- 
ceived but  fifteen  pounds  for  the  Essay  on  Criticism,  and 
twenty-two  pounds  for  the  Rape  of  the  Lock.  Byron 
calls  the  hacks  of  an  eminent  bookseller  of  that  period 
"  Jacob  Tonson's  ragamuffins."  Pope,  in  satirizing 
them,  dwelt  with  malicious  emphasis  on  their  rags 
and  their  hunger.  The  age  which  succeeded  that 
of  Queen  Anne  was  still  worse.  The  patronage  of 
nobles  and  politicians,  which  had  been  freely  extended 
to  the  best  poets  of  the  preceding  generation,  was 
withdrawn.  A  large  portion  of  the  life  of  so  eminent 
a  man  as  Dr.  Johnson  was  spent  in  a  desperate  and 
nearly  fruitless  attempt  to  keep  up  the  connection  be- 
tween his  body  and  soul,  constantly  threatened  by 
pressing  want.  The  character  of  a  considerable  portion 
of  professional  authors  was  little  higher  than  that  of 
street  beggars.  Occasionally  they  would  obtain  a  little 
money.  Kiot  and  gaming  soon  relieved  them  of  it. 
With  the  proceeds  of  a  successful  pamphlet  or  servile 
dedication,  to  use  the  words  of  another,  "  they  soon  diced 
themselves  into  spunging-houses,  or  drank  themselves 
into  fevers."  The  art  of  dodging  a  bailiff  and  bilking  a 
landlord  was  more  important  to  the  poet  than  the  art 
of  pointing  an  epigram  or  polishing  a  period.  Some 


AUTHORS.  29 

of  these  men  were  fortunate  enough  to  have  residences 
in  cellars  or  garrets ;  but  most  of  them,  with  the  blue  tent 
of  the  sky  pitched  above  their  heads,  must  have  waited 
all  night,  with  shivering  frames,  for  the  sweet  influences 
fabled  to  fall  from  Orion  and  the  Pleiades.  The  gulf 
that  yawned  between  the  mouth  of  a  poet  and  the  shop 
of  a  baker  was  almost  as  deep  and  wide  as  that  which 
spread  between  Lazarus  and  Dives.  Only  by  the  fiercest 
exertion  could  the  chasm  be  abridged,  and  a  frail  com- 
munication opened  between  the  two.  Of  course,  such 
persons,  with  five  ravenous  senses  unsupplied,  were  ready 
to  write  anything  which  would  afford  them  a  few  guineas. 
The  booksellers,  under  whose  "  inquisitorious  and  tyran- 
nical duncery  no  free  and  splendid  wit  could  flourish," 
keeping  them  accurately  poised  between  want  and  utter 
starvation,  employed  them  to  celebrate  any  remarkable 
event,  any  piece  of  domestic  scandal,  any  assault  upon 
decorum  and  decency  ,4  which  would  be  likely  to  sell. 
This  era,  the  darkest  and  most  dreary  in  English 
letters,  presents  the  most  melancholy  satire  on  author- 
ship extant.  There  will  you  see  the  last  infirmity  and 
profanation  of  intellect,  —  sin  shorn  of  its  dazzling  robes, 
and  strutting  no  longer  on  its  Satanic  stilts,  but  creeping, 
shrivelled  and  shivering,  to  its  slavish  tasks,  chained  to 
the  ever  restless  wheel  of  its  objectless  drudgery,  to  be 


30 


AUTHORS. 


tumbled  down  at  last  into  the  dust  with  poverty  and 
shame. 

We  now  come  to  a  delicate  part  of  the  subject,  which 
every  prudent  man  would  wish  to  avoid,  —  the  relation 
of  authors  to  domestic  life,  their  glory  or  shame  as  lovers 
and  husbands.  One  great  fact  here  stares  us  in  the 
face, — that  the  majority  of  those  men  who,  from  Homer 
downwards,  have  done  most  to  exalt  woman  into  a 
divinity,  have  either  been  bachelors  or  unfortunate  hus- 
bands. Prudence  forbid  that  I  should  presume  to  give 
the  philosophy  of  this  singular,  and,  doubtless,  accidental 
occurrence,  or  find  any  preestablished  harmony  be- 
tween heaven-scaling  imaginations  and  vixenish  wives. 
Still,  it  must  be  said,  that  not  only  with  regard  to  poets, 
but  authors  generally,  a  great  many  have  been  unhap- 
pily married;  and  a  great  many  more,  perhaps  you 
would  say,  unhappily  unmarried.  The  best  treatise  on 
divorce  was  written  by  the  laureate  of  Eve  and  the  cre- 
ator of  the  lady  in  Comus.  The  biography  of  scholars  and 
philosophers  sometimes  hints  at  voices  neither  soft  nor 
low  piercing  the  ears  of  men  meditating  on  Greek  roots, 
or  framing  theories  of  the  moral  sentiments.  You  all 
know  the  aidful  sympathy  that  Socrates  received  from 
Xantippe,  in  his  great  task  of  confuting  the  lying  inge- 
nuities of  the  Greek  sophists,  and  bringing  down  philos- 
ophy from  heaven  to  earth.  The  face  of  one  of  Eng- 


AUTHORS.  31 

land's  earliest  and  best  linguists  is  reported  to  have  often 
exhibited  crimson  marks,  traced  by  no  loving  fingers; 
and  Greek,  Hebrew,  Latin,  and  English,  must  often 
have  met  and  run  together  in  his  brain,  as  it  reeled 
beneath  the  confusing  ring  of  a  fair  hand  knocking  at  his 
ears.  The  helpmates  of  Whitelocke  and  Bishop  Coop- 
er were  tempestuous  viragos,  endowed  with  a  genius 
for  scolding,  who  burnt  their  husbands'  manuscripts, 

and  broke  in  upon  their  studies  and  meditations  with 

t 

reproaches  and  threats.  Hooker,  the  saint  and  sage  of 
English  divinity,  was  married  to  an  acute  vixen,  with  a 
temper  compounded  of  vinegar  and  saltpetre,  and  a 
tongue  as  explosive  as  gun-cotton.  Addison  espoused  a 
countess ;  and  spent  the  rest  of  his  life  in  taverns,  clubs, 
tnd  repentance. 

Some  men  of  genius,  Moliere  and  Rousseau,  for  ex- 
ample, have  had  unsympathizing  wives.  Sir  Walter 
Scott,  walking  once  with  his  wife  in  the  fields,  called 
her  attention  to  some  lambs,  remarking  that  they  were 
beautiful.  "  Yes,"  echoed  she,  "  lambs  are  beautiful,  — 
boiled ! "  That  incomparable  essayist  and  chirping  phi- 
losopher, Montaigne,  married  but  once.  When  his  good 
wife  left  him,  he  shed  the  tears  usual  on  such  occasions, 
and  said  he  would  not  marry  again,  though  it  were  to 
Wisdom  herself.  A  young  painter  of  great  promise 
once  told  ftir  Joshua  Reynolds  that  he  had  taken  a  wife. 


32  AUTHORS. 

"Married!"  ejaculated  the  horrified  Sir  Joshua;  "then 
you  are  ruined  as  an  artist."  Michael  Angelo,  when 
asked  why  he  never  married,  replied, — "  I  have  espoused 
my  art,  and  that  occasions  me  sufficient  domestic  cares  ; 
for  my  works  shall  be  my  children."  The  wives  of 
Dante,  Milton,  Dryden,  Addison,  Steele,  shed  no  glory 
on  the  sex,  and  brought  no  peace  to  their  firesides.  The 
bitterest  satires  and  noblest  eulogies  on  married  life  have 
come  from  poets.  Love,  indeed,  has  ever  been  the 
inspiration  of  poetry.  From  Theocritus  all  the  way 
down  to  the  young  gentleman  that  drizzled  in  yesterday's 
newspaper,  it  has  provoked  millions  on  millions  of  good 
and  bad  verses,  most  of  which  have  been  kindly  gathered 
by  Oblivion  under  her  dusky  wing.  Among  these 
mountains  of  amatory  poetry,  there  are  doubtless  some  of 
the  finest  imaginations  and  truest  and  noblest  sentiments 
ever  breathed  from  the  lips  of  genius ;  but  the  greater 
portion  only  prove,  that  if  love  softens  the  heart,  it  does 
not  always  decline  performing  a  similar  service  to  the 
head.  I  know  a  very  sensible  man  who  preserves  in  an 
iron  box  some  of  these  metrical  indiscretions  of  his  youth, 
in  order,  if  he  is  ever  accused  of  a  capital  crime,  that  he 
may  produce  them  as  furnishing  indubitable  proofs  of 
insanity.  The  most  notable  instance  of  inconstancy 
related  in  the  "loves  of  the  poets"  is  that  of  Lucy 
Sacheverell,  to  whom  Col.  Lovelace,  the  Philip  Sidney 


AUTHORS.  33 

of  Charles  I.'s  court,  was  warmly  attached.  He  cele- 
brated her  accomplishments  m  some  exquisite  poetry ; 
but,  on  his  being  taken  prisoner  in  one  of  the  wars  of  the 
time,  and  reported  to  be  dead,  she  hastily  married 
another.  He  soon  returned  to  his  native  land,  impre- 
cated divers  anathemas  on  the  sex,  and  declined  into  a 
vagabond,  —  dying  perhaps  of  a  malady,  common  enough 
in  dark  ages,  but  now  happily  banished  from  genteeV 

society;,  a  broken  heart. 

«• 

Perhaps  the  sweetest  pictures  in  the  poetry  of  human 
life  are  those  which  represent  the  domestic  felicity 
of  those  authors  who  married  happily.  The  wives 
of  Wieland,  Buffon,  Gesner,  Herder,  Priestley,  Words- 
worth, not  to  mention  others,  are  especially  honored 
among  women.  Who  has  not  sometimes  seen,  in  the 
wife  of  scholar  or  artist,  that  elusive  and  unutterable 
charm,  which  has  made  his  heart  echo  the  praise  of 
Fletcher's  ideal  Panthea? — 

"  She  is  not  fair 

Nor  beautiful ;  these  words  express  her  not : 
They  say  her  looks  have  something  excellent, 
That  wants  a  name  yet." 

Wordsworth,  with  that  pensive  spiritualism  which  char- 
acterizes all  his  poetry  relating  to  the  affections,  has  in 
three  lines  fitly  immortalized  his  own  noble  wife,  as 

3 


34  AUTHORS. 

"  She  who  dwells  with  me,  whom  I  have  loved 
With  such  communion,  that  no  place  on  earth 
Can  ever  be  a  solitude  to  me." 

Wherever,  in  fact,  a  noble  spirit  has  been  fortunate  in 
his  domestic  relations,  he  has  left  testimonials  in  his 
writings  that  those  human  affections,  which  are  the 
monopoly  of  none,  are  more  productive  of  solid  happi- 
ness than  wealth,  or  power,  or  fame  ;  than  learning  that 
comprehends  all  knowledge ;  than  understanding  which 
sweeps  over  the  whole  domain  of  thought ;  than  imag- 
inations which  rise  and  run  over  regions  to  which  the 
"  heaven  of  heavens  is  but  a  veil." 

Of  the  relations  of  authors  to  social  life,  of  their  habits, 
manners,  dispositions  in  society,  as  contrasted  with  those 
displayed  in  their  writings,  a  great  deal  that  is  interest- 
ing might  be  said.  A  man  of  letters  is  often  a  man 
with  two  natures, — one  a  book  nature,  the  other  a  human 
nature.  These  often  clash  sadly.  Seneca  wrote  in 
praise  of  poverty,  on  a  table  formed  of  solid  gold,  with 
two  millions  of  pounds  let  out  at  usury.  Sterne  was  a 
very  selfish  man ;  according  to  Warburton,  an  irreclaim- 
able rascal ;  yet  a  writer  unexcelled  for  pathos  and  char- 
ity. Sir  Richard  Steele  wrote  excellently  well  on  tem- 
perance, —  when  he  was  sober.  Dr.  Johnson's  essays  on 
politeness  are  admirable ;  yet  his  "  You  lie,  sir ! "  and 
"  You  don't  understand  the  question,  sir!"  were  too 


AUTHORS.  35 

common  characteristics  of  his  colloquies.  He  and  Dr. 
Shebbeare  were  both  pensioned  at  the  same  time.  The 
report  immediately  flew,  that  the  king  had  pensioned 
two  bears,  —  a  he-bear  and  a  she-bear.  Young,  whose 
gloomy  fancy  cast  such  sombre  tinges  on  life,  was  in 
society  a  brisk,  lively  man,  continually  pelting  his 
hearers  with  puerile  puns.  Mrs.  Carter,  fresh  from  the 
stern,  dark  grandeur  of  the  Night  Thoughts,  expressed 
her^ amazement  at  his  flippancy.  "Madam,"  said  he, 
"  there  is  much  difference  between  writing  and  talking." 
The  same  poet's  favorite  theme  was  the  nothingness  of 
worldly  things ;  his  favorite  pursuit  was  rank  and  riches. 
Had  Mrs.  Carter  noticed  this  incongruity,  he  might  have 
added,  —  "Madam,  there  is  much  difference  between 
writing  didactic  poems  and  living  didactic  poems." 
Bacon,  the  most  comprehensive  and  forward-looking  of 
modern  intellects,  and  in  feeling  one  of  the  most  benevo- 
lent, was  meanly  and  wickedly  ambitious  of  place.  Of 
the  antithesis  between  the  thoughts  of  this  great  bene- 
factor of  mankind  and  the  actions  of  this  inquisitor  and 
supple  politician,  Macaulay  remarks,  in  his  short,  sharp 
way,  —  "  To  be  the  leader  of  his  race,  in  the  career  of 
improvement,  was  in  his  reach.  All  this,  however, 
was  of  no  avail  while  some  quibbling  special  pleader 
was  promoted  before  him  to  the  bench ;  while  some 
heavy  country  gentleman  took  precedence  of  him  by 


36  AUTHORS. 

virtue  of  a  purchased  coronet;  while  some  pander, 
happy  in  a  fair  wife,  could  obtain  a  more  cordial  salute 
from  Buckingham;  while  some  buffoon,  versed  in  the 
latest  scandal  of  the  court,  could  draw  a  louder  laugh 
from  James." 

But  enough  for  the  external  life  of  authors.  Their 
inward  life  is  what  most  concerns  posterity,  and  consti- 
tutes their  immortal  existence.  We  might,  for  instance, 
speculate  on  the  outward  life  of  Shakspeare,  and  obtain 
tolerably  clear  notions  of  his  acts  and  conversation  as 
they  appeared  to  his  contemporaries ;  but  of  those  awful 
periods  when  the  conceptions  of  Lear  and  Hamlet,  of 
Macbeth  and  Timon,  dawned  upon  his  mind ;  of  those 
moments  when  his  shaping  and  fusing  imagination  trav- 
ersed earth  and  heaven,  "invisible  but  gazing;"  of 
those  hours  of  meditation  when  the  whole  chart  of  exist- 
ence lay  before  his  inward  eye,  and  he  sounded  all  its 
depths  and  shallows ;  —  these  we  must  seek  in  the  im- 
mortal pages  wherein  they  are  chronicled.  And  here 
lies  our  indebtedness  to  authors,  the  undying  benefactors 
of  all  ages.  How  shall  we  fitly  estimate  this  vast  inher- 
itance of  the  world's  intellectual  treasures,  to  which  all 
are  born  heirs  ?  What  words  can  declare  the  immeas- 
urable worth  of  books,  —  what  rhetoric  set  forth  the  im- 
portance of  that  great  invention  which  diffused  them 
over  the  whole  earth  to  glad  its  myriads  of  minds  ?  The 


AUTHORS.  37 

invention  of  printing  added  a  new  element  of  power  to 
the  race.  From  that  hour,  in  a  most  especial  sense,  the 
brain  and  not  the  arm,  the  thinker  and  not  the  soldier, 
hooks  and  not  kings,  were  to  rule  the  world ;  and  weap- 
ons, forged  in  the  mind,  keen-edged  and  brighter  than 
the  sunbeam,  were  to  supplant  the  sword  and  the  battle- 
axe.  The  conflicts  of  the  world  were  not  to  take  place 
altogether  on  the  tented  field ;  but  Ideas,  leaping  from  a 
world's^  awakened  intellect,  and  burning  all  over  with 
indestructible  life,  were  to  be  marshalled  against  princi- 
palities and  powers.  The  great  and  the  good,  whose 
influence  before  had  been  chiefly  over  individual  minds, 
were  now  to  be  possessed  of  a  magic,  which,  giving 
wings  to  their  thoughts,  would  waft  them,  like  so  many 
carrier  doves,  on  messages  of  hope  and  deliverance  to 
the  nations.  Words,  springing  fresh  and  bright  from 
the  soul  of  a  master-spirit,  and  dropping  into  congenial 
hearts  like  so  many  sparks  of  fire,  were  no  longer  to  lose 
this  being  with  the  vibrations  of  the  air  they  disturbed, 
or  moulder  with  the  papyrus  on  which  they  were  writ- 
ten, but  were  to  be  graven  in  everlasting  characters, 
and  rouse,  strengthen,  and  illumine  the  minds  of  all 
ages.  There  was  to  be  a  stern  death-grapple  between 
Might  and  Right,  —  between  the  heavy  arm  and  the 
ethereal  thought,  —  between  that  which  was  and  that 
which  ought  to  be  ;  for  there  was  a  great  spirit  abroad  in 


38  AUTHORS. 

the  world,  whom  dungeons  could  not  confine,  nor  oceans 
check,  nor  persecutions  subdue, — whose  path  lay  through 
the  great  region  of  ideas,  and  whose  dominion  was  over 
the  mind. 

If  such  were  the  tendency  of  that  great  invention 
which  leaped  or  bridged  the  barriers  separating  mind 
from  mind  and  heart  from  heart,  who  shall  calculate  its 
effect  in  promoting  private  happiness  ?  Books,  —  light- 
houses erected  in  the  great  sea  of  time,  —  books,  the 
precious  depositories  of  the  thoughts  and  creations  of 
genius,  —  books,  by  whose  sorcery  times  past  become 
time  present,  and  the  whole  pageantry  of  the  world's 
history  moves  in  solemn  procession  before  our  eyes ;  — 
these  were  to  visit  the  firesides  of  the  humble,  and  lavish 
the  treasures  of  the  intellect  upon  the  poor.  Could  we 
have  Plato,  and  Shakspeare,  and  Milton,  in  our  dwellings, 
in  the  full  vigor  of  their  imaginations,  in  the  full  freshness 
of  their  hearts,  few  scholars  would  be  affluent  enough  to 
afford  them  physical  support;  but  the  living  images  of 
their  minds  are  within  the  eyes  of  all.  From  their 
pages  their  mighty  souls  look  out  upon  us  in  all  their 
grandeur  and  beauty,  undimmed  by  the  faults  and  follies 
of  earthly  existence,  consecrated  by  time.  Precious  and 
priceless  are  the  blessings  which  books  scatter  around 
our  daily  paths.  We  walk,  in  imagination,  with  the 
noblest  spirits,  through  the  most  sublime  and  enchanting 


AUTHORS.  39 

regions, — regions  which,  to  all  that  is  lovely  in  the 
forms  and  colors  of  earth, 

"  Add  the  gleam, 

The  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land, 
The  consecration  and  the  poet's  dream." 

A  motion  of  the  hand  brings  all  Arcadia  to  sight.  The 
war  of  Troy  can,  at  our  bidding,  rage  in  the  narrowest 
chamber.  Without  stirring  from  our  firesides,  we  may 
roam  to  the  most  remote  regions  of  the  earth,  or  soar 
into  realms  where  Spenser's  shapes  of  unearthly  beauty 
flock  to  meet  us,  where  Milton's  angels  peal  in  our  ears 
the  choral  hymns  of  Paradise.  Science,  art,  literature, 
philosophy,  —  all  that  man  has  thought,  all  that  man  has 
done, — the  experience  that  has  been  bought  with  the  suf- 
ferings of  a  hundred  generations,  —  all  are  garnered  up 
for  us  in  the  world  of  books.  There,  among  realities,  in  a 
"  substantial  world,"  we  move  with  the  crowned  kings  of 
thought.  There  our  minds  have  a  free  range,  our  hearts 
a  free  utterance.  Reason  is  confined  within  none  of  the 
partitions  which  trammel  it  in  life.  The  hard  granite  of 
conventionalism  melts  away  as  a  thin  mist.  We  call 
things  by  their  right  names.  Our  lips  give  not  the  lie 
to  our  hearts.  We  bend  the  knee  only  to  the  great  and 
good.  We  despise  only  the  despicable ;  we  honor  only 
the  honorable.  In  that  world,  no  divinity  hedges  a  king, 


40  AUTHORS. 

no  accident  of  rank  or  fashion  ennobles  a  dunce,  or 
shields  a  knave.  There,  and  almost  only  there,  do  our 
affections  have  free  play.  "We  can  select  our  compan- 
ions from  among  the  most  richly  gifted  of  the  sons  of 
God,  and  they  are  companions  who  will  not  desert  us  in 
poverty,  or  sickness,  or  disgrace.  When  everything 
else  fails,  —  when  fortune  frowns,  and  friends  cool,  and 
health  forsakes  us,  —  when  this  great  world  of  forms 
and  shows  appears  a  "  two-edged  lie,  which  seems  hut 
ts  not,"  —  when  all  our  earth-clinging  hopes  and  ambi- 
tions melt  away  into  nothingness, 

"  Like  snow-falls  on  a  river, 
One  moment  white,  then  gone  forever,"  — 

we  are  still  not  without  friends  to  animate  and  console 
us,  —  friends,  in  whose  immortal  countenances,  as  they 
look  out  upon  us  from  books,  we  can  discern  no  change  ; 
who  will  dignify  low  fortunes  and  humble  life  with 
their  kingly  presence;  who  will  people  solitude  with 
shapes  more  glorious  than  ever  glittered  in  palaces; 
who  will  consecrate  sorrow  and  take  the  sting  from 
care ;  and  who,  in  the  long  hours  of  despondency  and 
weakness,  will  send  healing  to  the  sick  heart,  and 
energy  to  the  wasted  brain.  Well  might  Milton  exclaim, 
in  that  impassioned  speech  for  the  Liberty  of  Unlicensed 
Printing,  where  every  word  leaps  with  intellectual  life, 
—  "  Who  kills  a  man  kills  a  reasonable  creature,  God's 


AUTHORS.  41 

image ;  but  who  destroys  a  good  book  kills  reason  itself, 
kills  the  image  of  God,  as  it  were,  in  the  eye.  Many 
a  man  lives  a  burden  upon  the  earth;  but  a  good 
book  is  the  precious  life-blood  of  a  master  spirit,  em- 
balmed ana  treasured  up  on  purpose  for  a  life  beyond 
life!" 


NOVELS  AND   NOVELISTS* 
CHARLES  DICKENS. 


MUCH  has  been  said  and  written  on  the  uses  and 
abuses  of  fiction.  Novel-writing  and  novel-reading  have 
commonly  been  held  in  low  estimation  by  grave  and 
sensible  people,  or  rather  by  people  whose  gravity  has 
been  received  as  the  appropriate  garment  of  sense. 
Many  are  both  amused,  and  ashamed  of  being  amused 
by  this  class  of  compositions;  and,  accordingly,  in  the 
libraries  of  well-regulated  families,  untouched  volumes 
of  history  and  philosophy  glitter  on  prominent  book- 
shelves in  all  the  magnificence  of  burnished  bindings, 
while  the  poor,  precious  novel,  dog's-eared  and  wasted 
as  it  may  be  by  constant  handling,  is  banished  to  some 
secret  but  accessible  nook,  in  order  that  its  modest 
merit  may  not  evoke  polite  horror.  It  thus  becomes 
a  kind  of  humble  companion,  whose  prattle  is  pleas- 

*  Delivered  before  the  Boston  Mercantile  Library  Association, 
December,  1844. 


NOVELS    AND   NOVELISTS.  43 

ant  enough  when  alone,  but  who  must  be  cut  in 
genteel  company.  And  thus,  many  a  person  whose 
heart  is  beating  hard  in  admiration  of  Mr.  Richard 
Turpin's  ride  to  York,  or  whose  imagination  is  filled 
with  the  image  of  Mr.  James's  solitary  horseman  slowly 
wending  up  the  hill,  still  in  public  vehemently  chatters 
on  subjects  with  which  he  has  no  sympathy,  and  on 
books  which  he  has  never  read. 

Against  good  novels,  that  is,  against  vivid  representa- 
tions /5T  idealizations  of  life,  character,  and  manners,  in 
this  or  in  any  past  age,  there  would  seem  to  be  no  valid 
objection ;  but  this  department  of  literature  has  unfor- 
tunately been  a  domain  in  which  the  whole  hosts  of 
folly,  stupidity,  and  immorality,  have  encamped.  A 
good  portion  of  the  feeble  things  purporting  to  be  novels 
are  bad,  and  some  of  them  execrably  bad.  Ink-wasters, 
who  could  write  nothing  else,  whom  nature  never  in- 
tended to  write  anything,  have  still  considered  them- 
selves abundantly  qualified  to  write  fiction;  conse- 
quently, all  the  nonsense  and  fat-wittedness  in  poor 
perverted  human  nature  have  been  fully  represented  in 
the  congress  of  romance.  Of  all  printed  books  that  ever 
vexed  the  wise  and  charmed  the  foolish,  a  bad  novel  is 
probably  that  which  best  displays  how  far  the  mind  can 
descend  in  the  sliding  scale  of  sense  and  nature.  In  the 
art  of  embodying  imbecility  of  thought  and  pettiness  of 


44  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

sentiment  in  a  style  correspondingly  mean  and  gauzy, 
all  other  men  and  women  have  been  fairly  distanced  by 
certain  novelists,  not  altogether  unblessed  now  with 
popularity  and  influence. 

This  fact  brings  us  to  the  distinctions  existing  between 
the  widely  different  works  classed  under  the  common 
name  of  novels;  namely,  novels  written  by  men  of 
genius ;  novels  written  by  commonplace  men ;  and  novels 
written  by  dunces.  Commonplace  and  stupid  novels, 
and  commonplace  and  stupid  admirers  of  them,  every 
community  can  boast  of  possessing ;  but  prose  fictions  of 
the  higher  class  are  rare.  When,  however,  a  man  of 
genius  embodies  his  mind  in  this  form,  it  is  ridiculous  to 
allow  any  prejudice  against  the  name  to  prevent  us  from 
acquiring  the  knowledge  and  enjoying  the  delight  he  is 
able  to  convey.  If  he  be  a  great  novelist,  we  may  be 
sure  that  he  has  succeeded  in  a  department  of  letters 
requiring  a  richly-gifted  mind  and  heart,  and  that  his 
success  entitles  him  to  some  of  the  proudest  honors  of 
the  intellect. 

The  novel,  indeed,  is  one  of  the  most  effective,  if  not 
most  perfect  forms  of  composition,  through  which  a  com- 
prehensive mind  can  communicate  itself  to  the  world, 
exhibiting,  as  it  may,  through  sentiment,  incident,  and 
character,  a  complete  philosophy  of  life,  and  admitting  a 
dramatic  and  narrative  expression  of  the  abstract  princi 


CHARLES    DICKENS.  45 

pies  of  ethics,  metaphysics,  and  theology.  Its  range  is 
theoretically  as  wide  and  deep  as  man  and  nature.  Life 
is  its  subject,  life  in  all  its  changes  and  modifications,  by 
climate,  by  national  and  local  manners,  by  conventional 
usages,  by  individual  peculiarities,  by  distance  in  time 
and  space,  by  every  influence,  in  short,  operating  on  the 
complex  nature  of  man.  It  is  the  most  difficult  of  at 
modes  of  composition,  for,  in  its  perfection,  it  requires  a 
mind  capable  of  perceiving  and  representing  all  varieties 
of  life  and  character,  of  being  tolerant  to  all,  and  of  real- 
izing them  to  the  eye  and  heart  with  vivid  and  vital 
truth.  The  great  novelist  should  be  a  poet,  philosopher, 
and  man  of  the  world,  fused  into  one.  Understanding 
man  as  well  as  men,  the  elements  of  human  nature  as 
well  as  the  laws  of  their  combinations,  he  should  possess 
the  most  extensive  practical  knowledge  of  society,  the 
most  universal  sympathies  with  his  kind,  and  a  nature 
at  once  shrewd  and  impassioned,  observant  and  creative, 
with  large  faculties  harmoniously  balanced.  His  enthusi- 
asm should  never  hurry  him  into  bigotry  of  any  kind,  not 
even  into  bigoted  hatred  of  bigotry ;  for,  never  appearing 
personally  in  his  work  as  the  champion  of  any  of  his 
characters,  representing  all  faithfully,  and  studious  to 
give  even  Satan  his  due,  he  must  simply  exhibit  things 
in  their  right  relations,  and  trust  that  morality  of  effect 
will  result  from  truth  of  representation. 


46  NOVELS    AND   NOVELISTS  : 

It  is  evident  that  this  exacting  ideal  of  a  novelist  has 
never  been  realized.  In  most  of  the  novels  written  by 
men  of  powerful  talents,  we  have  but  eloquent  expres- 
sions of  one-sided  views  of  life.  In  some,  the  author 
represents  himself,  ideals  of  himself,  and  negations  of 
himself,  instead  of  mankind.  Others  are  rhetorical  ad- 
dresses, in  favor  of  vice  or  virtue,  religion  or  irreligion, 
clumsily  cast  into  a  narrative  and  colloquial  form,  in 
which  we  have  a  view  of  the  abstract  feebly  struggling 
after  the  concrete,  but  unable  to  achieve  its  laudable  pur- 
pose. In  some  novels  of  a  higher  grade,  we  notice  a 
predominance  of  the  poetical,  or  philanthropic,  or  moral 
element,  and  though  in  these  we  may  have  pictures,  the 
author  constantly  appears  as  showman.  Perhaps  Scott, 
of  all  novelists,  approaches  nearest  to  the  ideal,  as  far  as 
his  perceptions  in  the  material  and  spiritual  world  ex- 
tended. Whatever  lay  on  the  broad  mirror  of  his  imag- 
ination he  fairly  painted ;  but  there  were  many  things 
which  that  mirror,  glorious  as  it  was,  did  not  reflect. 
Fielding,  within  the  range  of  his  mind,  approaches  near 
absolute  perfection ;  and  if  he  had  possessed  as  keen  a 
sense  of  the  supernatural  as  the  natural,  he  might  have 
taken  the  highest  rank  among  great  constructive  and 
.-.reative  minds;  but  he  had  no  elevation  of  soul,  and 
little  power  of  depicting  it  in  imagination.  As  it  is., 
however,  the  life-like  reality  of  the  characters  and  scenes 


CHARLES    DICKENS.  47 

he  has  painted,  indicates  that  his  genius  was  bounded 
by  nothing  but  his  sentiments.  Perhaps  the  greatest 
single  novel,  judged  by  this  standard  of  comprehensive- 
ness, is  Goethe's  Wilhelm  Meister.  It  was  the  rich 
result  of  ten  years'  labor;  and  there  is  hardly  a  faculty 
of  the  mind,  a  feeling  of  the  heart,  or  an  aspiration  of 
the  soul,  which  has  not  contributed  something  to  its 
interest,  its  value,  or  its  beauty.  Imagination,  fancy, 
passion,  humor,  sentiment,  understanding,  observation, 
—  the  shrewdest  practical  wisdom,  the  loftiest  idealism, 
the  acutest  and  most  genial  criticism  on  art  and  litera- 
ture, the  keenest  satire  on  social  foibles,  —  all  have  their 
place  within  the  limits  of  one  novel,  without  producing 
confusion  or  discord ;  for  they  are  all  but  ministers 
working  the  will  of  one  self-conscious  and  far-darting  in- 
telligence, that  perceives  with  the  clearest  insight  each 
shape  and  shade  of  many-colored  life,  without  being 
swayed  by  any ;  delineating  everything,  yet  seemingly 
advocating  nothing;  and  allowing  virtue  and  vice,  knowl- 
edge and  ignorarice,  enthusiasm  and  mockery,  to  meet 
and  jostle,  with  a  provoking  indifference,  apparently,  to 
the  triumph  of  either.  But  perhaps  the  range  of  the 
characterization,  including,  as  it  does,  so  many  varying 
types  of  humanity,  from  the  vulgar  sensualist  to  the 
mystic  pietist,  is  more  to  be  admired  than  the  felicity 
with  which  each  is  individualized;  and  the  English 


48  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

reader  especially,  while  he  cannot  but  wonder  at  the 
author's  abundance  of  ideas,  and  be  thrilled  by  the 
transcendent  dramatic  excellence  displayed  in  the  delin- 
eation of  a  few  of  the  characters,  will  still  miss  that 
solid,  substantial,  indisputable  personality  he  ever  finds, 
not  only  in  the  creations  of  Shakspeare,  but  in  those  of 
Addison  and  Goldsmith,  of  Fielding  and  Scott.  In 
Wilhelm  Meister,  we  generally  think  more  of  the  knowl- 
edge of  man  and  nature  we  acquire  through  the  charac- 
ters, than  of  the  characters  themselves,  —  a  sign  that 
the  philosophic  and  the  ideal  have  not  been  realized 
throughout  with  sufficient  intensity  to  produce  perfect 
forms  of  individual  life. 

Although  English  literature  is  now,  in  respect  to 
novels  of  character  and  manners,  the  richest  in  the 
world,  we  still  find  that  the  novel  had  not  acquired 
much  eminence  as  a  department  of  imaginative  litera- 
ture until  about  the  middle  of  the  last  century.  Prose 
fiction  was  generally  abandoned  to  writers  who  lacked 
the  ability  to  embody  their  folly  or  indecency  in  verse. 
Richardson  was  the  first  man  of  genius  who  put  forth 
his  whole  strength  in  this  department  of  composition, 
and  Fielding  began  his  admirable  series  of  fictions  rather 
with  the  design  of  ridiculing  Richardson  than  of  forming 
a  new  school  of  novelists.  Smollett,  without  possessing 
Fielding's  depth  and  geniality  of  nature,  or  Richardson's 


CHARLES    DICKENS.  49 

intense  sentiment  and  hold  upon  the  passions,  still  ex- 
hibited so  large  a  knowledge  of  the  world,  such  immense 
fertility  of  invention,  such  skill  in  the  delineation  of 
humorists,  and  such  power  in  awakening  both  laughter 
and  terror,  that  his  works,  though  vitiated  by  the  caustic 
bitterness  of  his  temper,  and  by  a  misanthropic  vulgarity 
calculated  to  inspire  disgust  rather  than  pleasure,  have 
won  for  him  a  position  side  by  side  with  Richardson  and 
Fielding,  as  the  founder  of  an  influential  school  of  nov- 
elistst  Following  these  great  men  in  rapid  succession, 
came  Sterne,  Goldsmith,  Charles  Johnstone,  Fanny 
Burney,  Walpole,  Clara  Reeve,  Robert  Bage,  Macken- 
zie, and  Mrs.  Radcliffe,  each  of  them  possessing  a  vein 
of  originality,  and  occupying  some  new  department  of 
fiction ;  and  two  of  them,  Sterne  and  Goldsmith,  estab- 
lishing a  renown  which  promises  to  survive  all  mutations 
of  taste.  As  the  tone  of  morality  and  delicacy  in  works 
of  fiction  varies  with  the  moral  variations  of  society,  and 
as  the  Anglo-Saxon  mind  seems  penetrated  by  an  ine- 
radicable love  of  coarseness,  the  writings  of  many  men- 
tioned on  our  list  are  not  particularly  characterized  by 
decorum.  Indeed,  until  Miss  Burney  began  to  write,  in 
1778,  decency  was  not  considered  a  necessary  ingredient 
of  romance.  Richardson  has  a  minute  and  ludicrously 
formal  method  of  dwelling  upon  licentious  situations,  and 

Fielding  and  Smollett  include  a  considerable  amount  of 
4 


50  NOVELS    AND   NOVELISTS  : 

profanity  and  ribaldjy,  which  the  least  prudish  reader 
must  pronounce  superfluous.  The  dunces,  as  a  matter 
of  course,  adopted,  with  some  additions,  the  vulgarity  of 
their  betters,  and  superadded  large  quantities  of  stupidity 
from  their  own  minds.  Novels,  therefore,  soon  came 
under  the  ban  of  the  religious  and  prudent ;  anathemas 
were  freely  launched  at  them  from  the  fireside  and  the 
pulpit;  and  parents  might  be  excused  for  some  bitter- 
ness of  invective  transcending  the  cool  judgments  of 
criticism,  especially  if  a  son  was  engaged  in  running  the 
career  of  Peregrine  Pickle,  or  a  daughter  was  emulating 
the  little  eccentricities  of  Lady  Betty  Careless. 

But  about  the  beginning  of  the  present  century,  a  new 
order  of  fictions  came  into  fashion.  As  novelties  com- 
monly succeed  with  the  public,  some  enterprising  authors 
tried  the  speculation  of  discarding  indecency.  Senti- 
mentality, the  opposite  evil,  was  substituted,  and  the 
dynasty  of  rakes  was  succeeded  by  the  dynasty  of  flats. 
Lady  Jane  Brazenface,  the  former  heroine,  abdicated  in 
favor  of  Lady  Arabella  Dieaway.  The  bold,  free,  reck- 
less libertine  of  the  previous  romances,  now  gave  way  to 
a  lavendered  young  gentleman,  the  very  pink  and 
essence  of  propriety,  faultless  in  features  and  in  morals, 
and  the  undisputed  proprietor  of  crushed  affections  and 
two  thousand  sterling  a  year.  The  inspiration  of  this 
tribe  of  novelists  was  love  and  weak  tea ;  the  soul-shat- 


CHARLES    DICKENS.  51 

tering  period  of  courtship  was  their  field  of  action.  Con- 
sidered as  a  mirror  of  actual  life,  this  school  was  inferior 
to  the  worst  specimens  of  that  which  it  supplanted ;  for 
the  human  race  deserves  this  equivocal  compliment  to  its 
intelligence,  that  it  has  more  rogues  than  sentimentalists. 
However,  the  thing,  bad  as  it  was,  had  its  day.  Santo 
Sebastiano,  Thaddeus  of  Warsaw,  The  Children  of  the 
Abbey,  and  other  dispensations  of  a  similar  kind,  exer- 
cised the  despotism  of  sentimental  cant  over  the  circu- 
lating libraries,  and  their  painfully  perfect  Matildas, 
Annas,  Theresas,  and  Lauras,  became  the  ideal  of  the 
sex.  It  is  evident  that  these  novels,  as  we  see  them  now 
enveloped  in  their  moist  atmosphere  of  sickly  sensibility, 
required  the  smallest  capital  of  intelligence  that  ever  suf- 
ficed for  the  business  of  literature.  A  hero,  whose  duty 
it  is  to  suffer  impossible  things  and  say  foolish  ones; 
a  heroine,  oscillating  between  elegant  miseries  and  gen- 
teel ecstacies ;  a  testy  old  father,  from  whom  the  gout 
occasionally  forces  a  scrap  of  reason ;  a  talkative  maiden 
aunt,  who  imagines  the  hero  to  be  in  love  with  herself; 
a  pert  chambermaid,  who  fibs  and  cheats  for  her  mis- 
tress, and,  at  the  same  time,  looks  after  some  John  or 
Peter  on  whom  her  own  undying  affections  have  settled ; 
and  a  deep  villain,  who  is  the  only  sensible  person  in 
the  book; — these  shadows  of  character,  —  which  the 
author  has  the  impertinence  to  call  men  and  women,  — 


52  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

joined  to  an  unlimited  power  to  create  and  demolish  for- 
tunes, constitute  about  all  the  matter  we  have  been  able 
to  find  in  some  scores  of  these  novels.  The  style  is 
bountifully  sprinkled  with  a  kind  of  interjectional  pathos, 
consisting  mainly  of  a  frequent  repetition  of  ah !  and  oh  ! 
The  whole  wretched  mixture,  despicable  in  every  re- 
spect, still  passed  for  many  years,  with  far  the  largest 
portion  of  the  reading  public,  for  the  genuine  expression 
of  the  human  heart  and  imagination. 

It  is  principally  from  this  vapid  class  of  novels  that 
the  contemporary  parental  objection  to  works  of  fiction 
has  arisen.  Even  at  the  period  of  their  popularity,  they 
were  mostly  esteemed  by  persons  at  a  certain  age  of  life 
and  a  certain  stage  of  intellectual  development;  and 
there  are  doubtless  many  still  living  who  can  recollect 
the  peevish  disdain  with  which  the  master,  and  the  vol- 
uble indignation  with  which  the  mistress,  of  a  family, 
beheld  their  entrance  into  the  house. 

But  these  fictions  all  fled,  like  mists  before  the  sun 
when  Scott  appeared  with  Waverley.  Since  then,  the 
novel  has  risen  to  a  new  importance  in  literature,  and 
exerted  a  great  influence  upon  departments  of  intellect- 
ual labor  with  which  it  seems  to  have  little  in  common. 
Thierry,  one  of  the  greatest  of  modern  historians,  con- 
fesses that  the  reading  of  Ivanhoe  revealed  to  him  the 
proper  method  of  historical  composition.  From  being 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  53 

the  weak  companion  of  the  laziest  hours  of  the  laziest 
people,  the  novel,  under  the  impulse  it  received  from 
Scott,  became  the  illustrator  of  history,  the  mirror  and 
satirist  of  manners,  the  vehicle  of  controverted  opinions 
m  philosophy,  politics,  and  religion.  In  its  delineations 
of  character  and  its  romantic  and  heroical  incidents,  it 
took  the  place  of  the  drama  and  the  epic.  But  in  becom- 
ing the  most  popular  mode  of  communication  with  the 
public,  it  induced  an  indiscriminate  rush  of  mediocrity 
and  charlatanism  into  romance,  so  great  as  almost  to 
overwhelm  the  talent  and  genius  travelling  in  the  same 
path.  In  addition  to  this  multitude  of  rogues  and  dunces, 
there  was  another  multitude  of  preachers  and  controver- 
sialists, eager  to  inculcate  some  system,  good  or  bad,  re- 
lating to  other  departments  of  literature,  and  who  should 
have  written  treatises  and  sermons  instead  of  novels.  Mr. 
Plumer  Ward  desires  to  answer  some  arguments  against 
Christianity,  and  forthwith  publishes  a  novel.  Professor 
Sewall  has  a  dislike  to  the  law  of  supply  and  demand, 
hates  Lord  John  Russell  and  Sir  Robert  Peel,  and  con- 
siders Romanists  and  Dissenters  as  criminals ;  and  the 
result  of  these  opinions  and  antipathies  is  a  novel.  Dr. 
Croly  desires  to  give  a  narrative  of  some  political  and 
military  events,  and  to  analyze  the  characters  of  some 
prominent  statesmen,  during  the  present  century ;  and 
accordingly  declaims,  rhapsodizes,  and  pastes  the  purple 


54  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

patches  of  his  rhetoric  on  a  long  colloquial  dissertation, 
and  calls  the  agglomeration  a  novel.  There  is,  of 
course,  no  objection  to  the  matter  of  their  works,  pro- 
vided it  were  treated  dramatically ;  but  this  substitution 
of  opinions  for  characters  and  incidents,  is  altogether 
from  the  purpose  of  novel-writing. 

Of  these  various  classes  of  fiction,  that  which,  next  to 
Scott's,  attained  for  a  few  years  the  most  popularity  and 
influence,  was  the  school  of  Bulwer,  or  the  novel  of  fash- 
ionable life.  The  publication  of  Pelham  heralded  a  new 
intellectual  dynasty  of  fops  and  puppies.  Bulwer's  orig- 
inal idea  of  a  hero  was  the  greatest  satire  ever  written 
by  a  man  of  talent  on  his  own  lack  of  mental  elevation. 
He  attempted  to  reali2e  in  a  fictitious  character  his  no- 
tion of  what  a  man  should  be,  and  accordingly  produced 
an  agglomeration  of  qualities,  called  Pelham,  in  which 
the  dandy,  the  scholar,  the  sentimentalist,  the  statesman, 
the  roue,  and  the  blackguard,  were  all  to  be  included  in 
one  "many-sided"  man,  whose  merits  would  win  equal 
applause  from  the  hearty  and  the  heartless,  the  lover  and 
the  libertine.  Among  these,  however,  the  dandy  stood 
preeminent;  and  scholarship,  sentiment,  politics,  licen- 
tiousness, and  ruffianism,  were  all  bedizened  in  the  frip- 
pery of  Almacks.  To  this  character  Bulwer  added 
another,  who  may  be  described  in  general  terms  as  a 
man  burning  with  hatred  and  revenge,  misanthropical 


CHAIILES    DICKENS.  55 

and  moody,  whose  life  had  been  blasted  by  s6me  terrible 
wrong,  and  whose  miserable  hours  were  devoted  to  plots, 
curses,  lamentations,  and  "convulsing"  his  face.  These 
two  types  of  character,  the  one  unskilfully  copied  from 
Don  Juan,  the  other  from  Lara,  both  of  them  Byrornc  as 
far  as  Bulwer  could  understand  Byron,  reappeared,  like 
ghosts  of  ghosts,  in  most  of  his  succeeding  novels.  How- 
ever much  his  mind  may  have  grown,  and  his  experi- 
ence of  life  increased,  since  his  first  plunge  into  romance, 
he  nas  never  yet  fully  emancipated  himself  from  these 
original  shackles.  Indeed,  Bulwer  is  rather  an  eloquent 
and  accomplished  rhetorician  than  a  delineator  of  life 
and  character.  His  intellect  and  feelings  are  both  nar- 
rowed by  his  personal  character,  and  things  which  clash 
with  his  individual  tastes  he  criticizes  rather  than  delin- 
eates. Everything  that  he  touches  is  Bulwerized.  A 
man  of  large  acquirements,  and  ever  ready  to  copy  or 
pilfer  from  other  authors,  he  discolors  all  that  he  borrows. 
The  two  sisters  in  Eugene  Aram  are  copied  directly  from 
Scott's  Minna  and  Brenda  Troil,  and  their  relative  posi- 
tion is  preserved ;  but  throughout  there  is  manifested  an 
inability  to  preserve  the  features  of  the  originals  in  their 
purity,  and  accordingly  their  natural  bloom  soon  changes 
to  fashionable  rouge.  That  a  man  thus  without  humor 
and  dramatic  imagination  should  be  able  to  attain  a 
wile  reputation  as  a  novelist,  is  a  triumph  of  pretension 


56  NOVELS   AND    NOVELISTS  : 

which  must  give  delight  to  all  engaged  in  experimenting 
on  the  discrimination  of  the  public.  If  we  compare 
him  with  any  novelist  possessing  a  vivid  perception  of 
the  real,  in  actual  or  imaginary  life,  we  see  instantly  the 
gulf  which  separates  his  splendid  narrative  essays  from 
true  novels ;  and  his  unreal  mockeries  of  men  and  wo- 
men, quickly  passing  from  individualities  into  generaliz- 
ations, stand  out  as  embodied  opinions  on  life  and  char- 
acter, not  representations  of  life  and  character. 

In  regard  to  the  question  which  has  been  raised  as  to 
the  morality  of  Bulwer's  fictions,  it  is  hardly  possible  for 
any  person  who,  in  reading  a  book,  is  accustomed  to 
observe  the  biases  of  the  author's  mind,  to  come  but  to 
one  conclusion.      Their  general  tendency  is  not  only 
immoral,  but  it  is  evident  that  the  writer  plumes  himself 
on  being  superior  to  that  vulgar  code  of  practical  ethics 
which  keeps  society  from  falling  to  pieces ;  and,  in  its 
place,  favors  us  with  a  far  more  elegant  system,  of  which 
the  prominent  principle  is  a  morbid  voluptuousness,  com- 
pounded of  sensuality  and  noble  sentiments,  and  admit 
ting  many  resounding  epithets  of  virtue  and  religioi, 
when  they  will  serve  either  to  dignify  a  meanness  c 
point  a  period.      To  those  who  have  no  objection  t 
devils  provided  they  are  painted,  this  peculiar  fomi  t 
morality  may  have  its  attractions.     Considered  in  rei> 
tion  to  Bulwer's  mind,  it  is  one  illustration  of  his  defc"* 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  57 

as  £  novelist,  especially  as  indicating  his  lack  of  intel- 
lectual conscientiousness,  of  that  fine  sagacity  which 
detects  the  false  through  all  disguises,  and  seizes  on  the 
true  and  real  with  the  felicity  and  speed  of  instinct. 
Without  this  genius  for  the  truth,  no  novelist  can  suc- 
ceed in  a  consistent  exhibition  of  character ;  and  its 
absence  in  Bulwer  is  the  cause  of  the  unnatural  mixture 
of  vices  and  virtues  in  the  personages  of  his  novels.  In 
the  present  day,  at  least,  when  immorality  is  not  of  itself 
a  paSsport  to  popularity,  moral  obliquity  ever  indicates 
an  intellectual  defect. 

The  success  of  Bulwer  stirred  the  emulation  of  a 
crowd  of  imitators,  and  for  a  considerable  period  the 
domain  of  fiction  was  deluged  by  a  flood  of  fashionable 
novels.  Bulwer  possessed  shining  talents,  if  not  a  kind 
of  morbid  genius ;  but  most  of  those  who  followed  in  his 
wake  produced  a  class  of  vapid  fictions,  full  of  puppyism 
and  conceit,  illumined  by  hardly  a  ray  of  common  sense 
or  moral  sense,  and  as  unparalleled  in  their  dulness  as 
in  their  debility.  How  such  dreary  trash  contrived  to 
find  readers,  is  one  of  those  unexplained  mental  phenom- 
ena not  solvable  by  any  received  theory  of  the  mind. 
Fashionable  life  is,  at  the  best,  but  a  perversion  of  life, 
and  represents  human  nature  in  one  of  its  most  unnat- 
ural attitudes;  but  still  it  is  life,  and  affords  a  fair 
though  limited  field  for  light  satire  and  sketchy  charac- . 


58  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

terization.  The  authorlings  who  essayed  to  delineate  it, 
from  their  parlors  or  their  garrets,  brought  to  the  task  a 
large  stock  of  impudence  and  French  phrases,  perfect 
freedom  from  moral  obligations,  a  weakness  of  feeling 
which  it  would  be  a  compliment  to  call  feminine,  and  an 
extensive  acquaintance  with  the  modes  and  mysteries  of 
wearing  apparel.  The  drawing-room  and  the  boudoir, 
the  coxcomb's  drawl  and  the  fine  lady's  simper,  white 
waistcoats  and  top-boots,  —  these  were  their  inspiring 
themes.  The  leading  merit  of  these  authors  consisted 
in  their  complete  knowledge  of  clothes;  their  leading 
defect,  in  forgetting  to  put  men  and  women  into  them. 
Lady  Montague,  in  reference  to  a  titled  family  of  her 
day  named  Hervey,  said  that  God  had  created  men, 
women,  and  Herveys.  The  fashionable  novelists  delin- 
eated the  Herveys. 

About  the  time  that  this  way  of  writing  nonsense  had 
lost  its  attractiveness,  and  every  respectable  critic  wel- 
comed each  new  specimen  of  it  with  an  ominous  excla- 
mation of  disgust,  Charles  Dickens  appeared  with  the 
Pickwick  Papers.  The  immediate  and  almost  unprec- 
edented popularity  he  attained  was  owing  not  more  to 
his  own  genius  than  to  the  general  contempt  for  the 
school  he  supplanted.  After  ten  years  of  conventional 
frippery  and  foppery,  it  was  a  relief  to  have  once  more  a 
view  of  the  earth  and  firmament,  —  to  feel  once  more 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  59 

one  of  those  touches  of  nature  "  which  make  the  whole 
world  kin."  Here  was  a  man,  at  last,  with  none  of  the 
daintiness  of  genteel  society  in  his  manner,  belonging  to 
no  clique  or  sect,  with  sympathies  embracing  widely 
varying  conditions  of  humanity,  and  whose  warm  heart 
and  observant  eye  had  been  collecting  from  boyhood 
those  impressions  of  man  and  nature  which  afterwards 
gushed  out  in  exquisite  descriptions  of  natural  scenery, 
or  took  shape  in  his  Pickwicks,  Wellers,  Vardens,  Peck- 
sni&s,""and  their  innumerable  brotherhood. 

Dickens,  as  a  novelist  and  prose  poet,  is  to  be  classed 
in  the  front  rank  of  the  noble  company  to  which  he  be- 
longs. He  has  revived  the  novel  of  genuine  practical 
life,  as  it  existed  in  the  works  of  Fielding,  Smollett,  and 
Goldsmith,  but  at  the  same  time  has  given  to  his  mate- 
rials an  individual  coloring  and  expression  peculiarly  his 
own.  His  characters,  like  those  of  his  great  exemplars, 
constitute  a  world  of  their  own,  whose  truth  to  nature 
every  reader  instinctively  recognizes  in  connection  with 
their  truth  to  Dickens.  Fielding  delineates  with  more 
exquisite  art,  standing  more  as  the  spectator  of  his  per- 
sonages, and  commenting  on  their  actions  with  an  ironi- 
cal humor,  and  a  seeming  innocence  of  insight,  which 
pierces  not  only  into  but  through  their  very  nature,  lay- 
ing bare  their  inmost  unconscious  springs  of  action,  and 
in  every  instance  indicating  that  he  understands  them 


60  NOVELS   AKD   NOVELISTS  : 

better  than  they  understand  themselves.  It  is  this  per- 
fection of  knowledge  and  insight  which  gives  to  his 
novels  their  naturalness,  their  freedom  of  movement,  and 
their  value  as  lessons  in  human  nature  as  well  as  con- 
summate representations  of  actual  life.  Dickens's  eye 
for  the  forms  of  things  is  as  accurate  as  Fielding's,  and 
his  range  of  vision  more  extended ;  but  he  does  not 
probe  so  profoundly  into  the  heart  of  what  he  sees,  and 
he  is  more  led  away  from  the  simplicity  of  truth  by  a 
tricksy  spirit  of  fantastic  exaggeration.  Mentally  he  is 
indisputably  below  Fielding;  but  in  tenderness,  in  pathos, 
in  sweetness  and  purity  of  feeling,  in  that  comprehen- 
siveness of  sympathy  which  springs  from  a  sense  of 
brotherhood  with  mankind,  he  is  as  indisputably  above 
him. 

The  tendency  of  Dickens's  genius,  both  in  delineating 
the  actual  and  the  imaginary,  is  to  personify,  to  individu- 
alize. This  makes  his  page  all  alive  with  character.  Not 
only  does  he  never  treat  of  man  in  the  abstract,  but  he 
gives  personality  to  the  rudest  shows  of  nature,  every- 
thing he  touches  becoming  symbolic  of  human  sympa- 
thies or  antipathies.  There  is  no  writer  more  deficient  in 
generalization.  His  comprehensiveness  is  altogether  of 
the  heart,  but  that  heart,  like  the  intelligence  of  Bacon's 
cosmopolite,  is  not  "  an  island  cut  off  from  other  men's 
lands,  but  a  continent  which  joins  to  them."  His  obser 


CHARLES    DICKENS.  61 

vation  of  life  thus  beginning  and  ending  with  individuals, 
it  seems  strange  that  those  highly  sensitive  and  patriotic 
Americans  who  paid  him  the  compliment  of  flying  into 
a  passion  with  his  peevish  remarks  on  our  institutions, 
should  have  overlooked  the  fact  that  his  mind  was  alto- 
gether destitute  of  the  generalizing  qualities  of  a  states- 
man, and  that  an  angry  humorist  might  have  made 
equally  ludicrous  pictures  of  any  existing  society.  When 
his  work  on  America  was  quoted  in  the  French  Chamber 
of  Deputies,  M.  de  Tocqueville  ridiculed  the  notion  that 
any  opinions  of  Mr.  Dickens  should  be  referred  to  in  that 
place  as  authoritative.  There  is  a  great  difference  be- 
tween the  criticism  of  a  statesman  and  the  laughter  of  a 
tourist,  especially  when  the  tourist  laughs  not  from  his 
heart,  but  his  bile.  The  statesman  passes  over  individ- 
ual peculiarities  to  seize  on  general  principles,  while  the 
whole  force  of  the  other  lies  in  the  description  of  individ- 
ual peculiarities.  Dickens,  detecting  with  the  nicest  tact 
the  foibles  of  men,  and  capable  of  setting  forth  our  Be- 
vans,  Colonel  Tompkinses,  and  Jefferson  Bricks,  in  all 
the  comic  splendor  of  humorous  exaggeration,  is  still 
unqualified  to  abstract  a  general  idea  of  national  charac- 
ter from  his  observation  of  persons.  A  man  immeasur- 
ably inferior  to  him  in  creative  genius  might  easily 
excel  him  in  that  operation  of  the  mind.  Indeed,  were 
Dickens's  understanding  as  comprehensive  as  his  heart, 


62  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

and  ai,  vigorous  as  his  fancy,  he  would  come  near  realiz- 
ing the  ideal  of  a  novelist ;  but,  as  it  is,  it  is  as  ridicu- 
lous to  be  angry  with  any  generalizations  of  his  on 
American  institutions  and  politics,  as  it  would  be  to 
inveigh  against  him  for  any  heresies  he  might  blunder 
into  about  innate  ideas,  the  freedom  of  the  will,  or  origi- 
nal sin.  Besides,  as  Americans,  we  have  a  decided 
advantage  over  our  transatlantic  friends,  even  in  the 
matter  of  being  caricatured  by  the  novelist  whom  both 
are  rivals  in  admiring;  for  certainly,  if  there  be  any 
character  in  which  Dickens  has  seized  on  a  national 
trait,  that  character  is  Pecksniff,  and  that  national  trait 
is  English. 

The  whole  originality  and  power  of  Dickens  lies  in 
this  instinctive  insight  into  individual  character,  to  which 
we  have  already  referred.  He  has  gleaned  all  his  facts 
from  observation  and  sympathy,  in  a  diligent  scrutiny 
of  actual  life,  and  no  contemporary  author  is  less  in- 
debted to  books.  His  style  is  all  his  own,  its  quaint 
texture  of  fancy  and  humor  being  spun  altogether  from 
his  own  mind,  with  hardly  a  verbal  felicity  which  bears 
the  mark  of  being  stolen.  In  painting  character  he  is 
troubled  by  no  uneasy  sense  of  himself.  When  he  is 
busy  with  Sam  Weller  or  Mrs.  Nickleby,  he  forgets 
Charles  Dickens.  Not  taking  his  own  character  as  the 
test  of  character,  but  entering  with  genial  warmth  into 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  63 

the  peculiarities  of  others,  and  making  their  joys  and 
sorrows  his  own,  his  perceptions  are  not  bounded  by  his 
personality,  but  continually  apprehend  and  interpret  new 
forms  of  individual  being;  and  thus  his  mind,  by  the 
readiness  with  which  it  genially  assimilates  other  minds, 
and  the  constancy  with  which  it  is  fixed  on  objects  exter- 
nal to  itself,  grows  with  every  exercise  of  its  powers. 
By  this  felicity  of  nature,  the  man  who  began  his  lit- 
erary life  with  a  condemned  farce,  a  mediocre  opera,  and 
some  slight  sketches  of  character,  written  in  a  style 
which  but  feebly  indicated  the  germs  of  genius,  produced 
before  the  expiration  of  eight  years,  The  Pickwick  Pa- 
pers, Oliver  Twist,  Nicholas  Nickleby,  The  Old  Curi- 
osity Shop,  and  Martin  Chuzzlewit,  in  a  continually 
ascending  scale  of  intellectual  excellence,  and  achieved  a 
fame  not  only  gladly  recognized  wherever  the  English 
tongue  was  spoken,  but  which  extended  into  France, 
Germany,  Italy,  and  Holland,  and  caused  the  translation 
of  his  works  into  languages  of  which  he  hardly  under- 
stood a  word.  Had  he  been  an  egotist,  devoured  by  a 
ravenous  vanity  for  personal  display,  and  eager  to  print 
the  image  of  himself  on  the  popular  imagination,  his 
talents  would  hardly  have  made  him  known  beyond 
the  street  in  which  he  lived,  and  his  mind  by  self-admi- 
ration would  soon  have  been  self-consumed.  His  fellow- 
feeling  with  his  race  is  his  genius. 


64  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS. 

The  humanity,  the  wide-ranging  and  healthy  sympa- 
thies, and,  especially,  the  recognition  of  the  virtues 
which  obtain  among  the  poor  and  humble,  so  observable 
in  the  works  of  Dickens,  are  in  a  great  degree  charac- 
teristic of  the  age,  and  without  them  popularity  can 
hardly  be  won  in  imaginative  literature.  The  sentiment 
of  humanity,  indeed,  or  a  hypocritical  affectation  of  it, 
has  become  infused  into  almost  all  literature  and  speech, 
from  the  sermons  of  Dr.  Channing  to  the  feuilletons  of 
Eugene  Sue.  It  is  exceedingly  difficult  for  a  man  to  be 
as  narrow  as  he  could  have  been  had  he  lived  a  century 
ago.  No  matter  how  bigoted  may  be  the  tendencies  of 
his  nature,  no  matter  how  strong  may  be  his  desire  to 
dwell  in  a  sulky  isolation  from  his  race,  he  cannot 
breathe  the  atmosphere  of  his  time  without  feeling  occa- 
sionally a  generous  sentiment  springing  to  his  lips,  with- 
out perceiving  occasionally  a  liberal  opinion  stealing  into 
his  understanding.  He  cannot  creep  into  any  nook  or 
corner  of  seclusion,  but  that  some  grand  sentiment  or 
noble  thought  will  hunt  him  out,  and  surprise  his  soul 
with  a  disinterested  emotion.  In  view  of  this  fact,  a 
bigot,  who  desires  to  be  a  man  of  the  tenth  century,  who 
strives  conscientiously  to  narrow  his  intellect  and  shut 
his  heart,  who  mumbles  the  exploded  nonsense  of  past 
tyranny  and  exclusiveness,  but  who  is  still  forced  into 
some  accommodation  to  the  spirit  of  the  age  in  which  he 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  6£ 

lives,  is  worthy  rather  of  the  tender  commiseration  than 
the  shrewish  invective  of  the  philanthropists  whom  he 
hates  but  imitates. 

Now  Dickens  has  an  open  sense  for  all  the  liberal 
influences  of  his  time,  and  commonly  surveys  human 
nature  from  the  position  of  charity  and  love.  For  the 
foibles  of  character  he  has  a  sort  of  laughing  toleration  ; 
and  goodness  of  heart,  no  matter  how  overlaid  with  ludi- 
crous weaknesses,  has  received  from  him  its  strongest 
and  subtlest  manifestations.  He  not  only  makes  us  love 
our  kind  in  its  exhibitions  of  moral  beauty,  but  also 
when  frailties  mingle  with  its  excellence.  Distinguish- 
ing, with  the  instinctive  tact  of  genius,  the  moral  differ- 
ences of  persons  and  actions,  and  having  a  nicely  ad- 
justed scale  of  the  degrees  of  folly  and  wickedness,  not 
one  of  his  characters  is  just  as  wise  or  as  foolish,  as 
good  or  as  bad,  as  another ;  and  he  also  contrives  to  effect 
that  reconciliation  of  charity  and  morality,  by  which  our 
sympathies  with  weakness  and  toleration  of  error  never 
run  into  a  morbid  sentimentality.  He  deals  in  no  soph- 
istries to  make  evil  appear  good,  and  the  worse  the  bet- 
ter reason.  He  does  not,  as  Bulwer  is  apt  to  do,  dress 
up  a  crowd  of  sharpers  and  adulterers  in  the  purple  and 
fine  linen  of  rhetoric,  and  then  demand  us  to  wish  them 
well  in  their  business,  —  an  example  of  abstinence  from 

a  common  peccadillo  of  romancers  worthy  of  especial 
5 


66  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

praise  in  an  age  which  appreciates  George  Sand  ani 
Dumas.  If  he  refrains  from  thus  superadding  noble  sen- 
timents to  animal  appetites,  he  evolves,  with  a  sagacity 
in  which  he  is  only  excelled  by  Wordsworth,  beautiful 
and  heroic  qualities  from  humble  souls,  disguised  though 
they  may  be  in  unsightly  forms,  and  surrounded  by  gro- 
tesque accompaniments.  He  makes  the  fact  that  happi- 
ness and  virtue  are  not  confined  to  any  one  class  a  real- 
ity to  the  mind  ;  and,  by  shedding  over  his  pictures  the 
consecrations  of  a  heart  full  of  the  kindliest  sympathies, 

11  Rustic  life  and  poverty 
Grow  beautiful  beneath  his  touch." 

Kit  Nubbles,  in  the  Old  Curiosity  Shop,  is  a  pertinent 
example,  among  numerous  others,  of  this  searching  hu- 
manity of  Dickens.  Here  is  a  boy,  rough,  uneducated, 
ill-favored,  the  son  of  a  washer-woman,  the  very  opposite 
of  a  common  novelist's  idea  of  the  interesting,  with  a 
name  which  at  once  suggests  the  ludicrous;  yet,  as 
enveloped  in  the  loving  humor  of  Dickens,  he  becomes 
a  person  of  more  engrossing  interest  and  affection  than  a 
thousand  of  the  stereotyped  heroes  of  fiction.  We  not 
only  like  him,  but  the  whole  family,  Mrs.  Nubbles,  Jacob, 
the  baby  and  all ;  and  yet  nothing  is  overcharged  in  the 
description,  and  every  circumstance  calculated  to  make 
Kit  an  object  for  laughter  is  freely  used.  The  materials 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  67 

for  numberless  characters  equally  as  interesting  are 
within  the  reach  of  all  novelists  ;  but  most  of  them  are 
ridden  by  some  nightmare  of  dignity  or  gentility,  which 
compels  them  to  pass  by  the  hero  in  the  alley  for  somf 
piece  of  etiquette  and  broadcloth  in  the  drawing-room 
It  is  not  the  least  of  Dickens's  merits  that  he  excelled  al] 
his  contemporaries,  not  by  attempting  to  rival  them  on 
their  own  selected  vantage-ground,  but  by  availing  him- 
self of  matter  which  they  deemed  only  worthy  of  pitying 
contempt.  He  introduced  the  people  of  England  to  its 
aristocracy ;  and  though  there  were  not  wanting  dainty 
and  vulgar  spirits  to  call  his  novels  "  low,"  he  soon  not 
only  gained  the  popular  voice,  but  he  overthrew  the 
fashionable  novelists  in  their  own  circles,  and  his  Wel- 
lers  and  Swivellers,  edging  their  way  into  boudoirs  and 
parlors,  supplanted  Pelhams  and  Cecils  in  the  estimation 
of  countesses. 

In  thus  representing  life  and  character,  there  are  two 
characteristics  of  his  genius  which  startle  every  reader 
by  their  obviousness  and  power,  —  humor  and  pathos  ; 
but,  in  respect  to  the  operation  of  these  qualities  in  his 
delineations,  critics  have  sometimes  objected  that  his 
humor  is  apt  to  run  into  fantastic  exaggeration,  and  his 
pathos  into  sentimental  excess.  Indeed,  in  regard  to  his 
humorous  characters,  it  may  be  said  that  the  vivid  inten- 
sity with  which  he  conceives  them,  and  the  overflowing 


68  NOVELS  AND  NOVELISTS  : 

abundance  of  joy  and  merriment  which  springs  instmc"** 
ively  up  from  the  very  fountains  of  his  being  at  the 
slightest  hint  of  the  ludicrous,  sometimes  lead  him  to  the 
very  verge  of  caricature.  He  seems  himself  to  be  taken 
by  surprise,  as  his  glad  and  genial  fancies  throng  into 
his  brain,  and  to  laugh  and  exult  with  the  beings  he  has 
called  into  existence,  in  the  spirit  of  a  man  observing, 
not  creating.  Squeers  and  Pecksniff,  Sim  Tappertit 
and  Mark  Tapley,  Tony  Weller  and  old  John  Willett, 
although  painted  with  such  distinctness  that  we  seem  to 
see  them  with  the  bodily  eye,  we  still  feel  to  be  some- 
what overcharged  in  the  description.  They  are  carica- 
tured more  in  appearance  than  reality,  and  if  grotesque 
in  form,  are  true  and  natural  at  heart.  Such  caricature 
as  this  is  to  character  what  epigram  is  to  fact,  —  a  mode 
of  conveying  truth  more  distinctly  by  suggesting  it 
through  a  brilliant  exaggeration.  When  we  say  of  a 
man,  that  he  goes  for  the  greatest  good  of  the  greatest 
number,  but  that  the  greatest  number  to  him  is  number 
one,  we  express  the  fact  of  his  selfishness  as  much  as 
though  we  said  it  in  a  literal  way.  The  mind  of  the 
reader  unconsciously  limits  the  extravagance  into  which 
Dickens  sometimes  runs,  and,  indeed,  discerns  the  actual 
features  and  lineaments  of  the  character  shining  the 
more  clearly  through  it.  Such  extravagance  is  com- 
monly a  powerful  stimulant  to  accurate  perception,  espec- 


CHARLES    DICKENS.  69 

ially  to  readers  who  lack  fineness  and  readiness  of  intel- 
lect. It  is  not  that  caricature  which  has  no  foundation 
but  in 

"  The  extravagancy 
And  crazy  ribaldry  of  fancy ;" 

but  caricature  based  on  the  most  piercing  insight  into 
actual  life ;  so  keen,  indeed,  that  the  mind  finds  relief  or 
pleasure  in  playing  with  its  own  conceptions.  Shak- 
speare  often  condescends  to  caricature  in  this  way,  and 
so  do  Cervantes,  Hogarth,  Smollett,  and  Scott.  Though 
it  hardly  approaches  our  ideal  of  fine  characterization,  it 
has  its  justification  in  the  almost  universal  practice  of 
men  whose  genius  for  humorous  delineation  cannot  be 
questioned. 

That  Dickens  is  not  led  into  this  vein  of  exaggeration 
by  those  qualities  of  wit  and  fancy  which  make  the  cari- 
caturist, is  proved  by  the  solidity  with  which  his  works 
rest  on  the  deeper  powers  of  imagination  and  humor.  A 
caricaturist  rarely  presents  anything  but  a  man's  peculi- 
arity, but  Dickens  ever  presents  the  man.  He  so  pre- 
serves the  keeping  of  character  that  everything  said  or 
done  by  his  personages  is  either  on  a  level  with  the 
original  conception  or  develops  it.  They  never  go  be- 
yond the  pitch  of  thought  or  feeling  by  which  their  per- 
sonality is  limited.  Thus,  Tony  Weller,  whose  round 
fat  body  seems  to  roll  about  in  a  sea  of  humor,  makes  us 


""0  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

laugh  at  his  sayings  as  much  because  he  says  them  as 
for  any  merriment  they  contain  in  themselves.  His 
oddities  of  remark  are  sufficiently  queer  to  excite  laugh- 
ter, but  they  receive  their  peculiar  unction  from  his  con- 
ception of  his  own  importance  and  his  belief  in  the 
unreachable  depths  of  his  own  wisdom.  Mr.  Pickwick 
compliments  the  intelligence  of  his  son  Sam.  "  Werry 
glad  to  hear  of  it,  sir,"  he  replies  ;  "  I  took  a  great  deal 
o'  pains  in  his  eddication,  sir;  let  him  run  the  streets 
when  he  wos  very  young,  and  shift  for  hisself.  It 's  the 
only  way  to  make  a  boy  sharp,  sir."  His  infallibility  in 
matters  relating  to  matrimony  and  widows  is  a  good 
instance  of  the  method  in  which  a  novelist  may  produce 
ludicrous  effect  by  emphasizing  an  oddity  of  opinion,  and 
^at  the  same  time  connect  it  with  the  substance  of  char- 
acter. When  Sam  sends  the  Valentine  to  Mary,  the 
old  man's  forecasting  mind  sees  the  consequences,  and 
he  bursts  out  in  that  affecting  rebuke,  — "  To  see  you 
married,  Sammy,  to  see  you  a  deluded  wictim,  and 
thinkin'  in  your  innocence  it 's  all  werry  capital.  It 's  a 
dreadful  trial  to  a  father's  feelin's,  that  'ere,  Sammy." 
He  is  troubled  by  an  obstinate  suspicion  that  he  himself 
is  especially  marked  out  as  an  object  for  the  machina- 
tions of  widows.  In  a  contemptuous  account  of  a  jour- 
ney he  made  on  a  railroad,  he  says,  "  I  wos  locked  up 
in  a  close  carriage  with  a  living  widdur ;  and  I  believe 


CHARLES    DICKENS.  71 

it  wos  only  because  we  wos  alone,  and  there  wos  no 
clergyman  in  the  conweyance,  that  that  'ere  widdur 
did  n't  marry  me  before  we  reached  the  half-way  sta- 
tion." He  is  a  coachman  of  forty  years,  standing,  and 
accordingly  has  a  wise  scorn  of  all  railroads.  "  As  for 
the  ingein,"  he  says,  "  as  is  always  a  pourin'  out  red  hot 
coals  at  night,  and  black  smoke  in  the  day,  the  sensiblest 
thing  it  does,  in  my  opinion,  is  ven  there 's  something  in 
the  vay,  and  it  sets  up  that  frightful  scream  vich  seems 
to  say,  now  here 's  two  hundred  and  forty  passengers  in 
the  werry  greatest  extremity  of  danger,  and  here 's  their 
two  hundred  and  forty  screams  in  vun."  He  is,  indeed, 

<r 

the  very  Lord  Burleigh  of  low  life ;  and  from  those  par- 
oxysms of  inward  chuckles,  —  which  generally  termi- 
nated in  "as  near  an  approach  to  a  choke  as  an  elderly 
gentleman  can  with  safety  sustain,"  —  through  all  the 
variety  of  his  sayings  and  doings,  to  his  earnest  exhor- 
tation that  Sam  should  spell  Weller  with  a  V,  he  never 
loses  his  substantial  personality,  never  becomes  anything 
but  Tony  Weller. 

Much  of  Dickens's  most  exquisite  and  most  exube- 
rant humor  is  displayed  in  representing  characters  com- 
pounded of  vanity,  conceit,  and  assurance.  His  Artful 
Dodgers  and  Mr.  Baileys  are  cases  in  point.  They  re- 
mind you  of  the  child  who  ran  away  from  his  parents 
when  he  was  only  a  year  old,  because  he  understood 


NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

they  intended  to  call  him  Caleb.  The  little,  thievish 
ragged  Dodger,  when  brought  before  the  police  court, 
points  to  the  judge,  and  politely  requests  to  be  informed 
"  who  is  that  old  file  up  there ;"  and  warns  the  court  not 
to  keep  him  long,  as  he  has  an  engagement  to  dine  with 
the  "  wice-president  of  the  House  of  Commons."  This 
conceit,  varied  according  to  age  and  character,  mingles 
with  the  other  peculiarities  of  the  two  Wellers,  JohnWil- 
lett,  Mr.  Mantalini,  and  a  score  of  others.  There  is  Sim 
Tappertit,  the  sublime  apprentice,  conceit  and  bathos 
embodied,  who  is  troubled  by  his  soul's  getting  into  his 
head,  and  disturbed  by  "  inward  workings  after  a  higher 
calling"  than  making  locks.  Mr.  Kenwigs,  in  Nicholas 
Nickleby,  is  an  elderly  Tappertit,  whose  discourse  is 
pitched  on  a  more  uniform  key  of  fustian.  But  Mr. 
Richard  Swiveller  is  probably  the  most  splendid  speci- 
men of  the  class,  and  is  a  fine  example  of  the  felicity 
with  which  Dickens  can  tread  the  dizziest  edges  of  char- 
acterization without  sinking  into  mere  caricature.  Dick 
is  a  sort  of  shabby  Sir  Harry  Wildair,  a  reckless, 
feather-brained,  good-natured  vagabond,  with  no  depth 
of  guile,  and  whose  irregularities  are  the  result  of  idle- 
ness, vanity,  egotism,  and  a  great  flow  of  spirits.  With 
a  vast  opinion  of  his  own  abilities,  he  is  still  overreached 
by  every  knave  he  encounters,  and  his  life  is  accordingly 
a  descent  from  one  "  crusher"  to  another.  He  is  so  vain 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  73 

that  he  almost  believes  his  own  self-exalting  lies ;  and  he 
cannot  possibly  see  things  as  they  are.  When  the  old 
grandfather  is  disturbed  by  the  demands  of  his  graceless 
grandson  for  money,  Dick  is  very  much  surprised  that 
the  "jolly  old  grandfather  should  decline  to  fork  out 
with  that  cheerful  readiness  which  is  always  so  pleasant 
and  agreeable  at  his  time  of  life."  His  head  is  full  of 
scraps  of  songs  and  plays,  which  he  has  a  singular  felic- 
itous infelicity  in  quoting  to  sustain  the  sentiment  of 
the  moment ;  and  his  slang,  ever  accompanying  his  sen- 
timent, is  as  characteristic  as  the  soil  on  his  linen,  or 
the  marks  of  Time's  "effacing  fingers"  on  his  flash  coat. 
When  jilted  by  Miss  Wackles,  he  says,  in  parting,  "  I 
go  away  with  feelings  that  may  be  conceived,  but  cannot 
be  described,  feeling  within  myself  the  desolating  truth 
that  my  best  affections  have  received  this  night  a  sti- 
fler;"  but  he  then  adds,  from  the  promptings  of  his 
vanity,  and  with  reference  to  his  proposed  suit  to  little 
Nell,  "  that  a  young  girl  of  wealth  and  beauty  is  grow- 
ing up  at  the  present  moment  for  me,  and  has  requested 
her  next  of  kin  to  propose  for  my  hand,  which,  having  a 
kindness  for  some  members  of  her  family,  I  have  con- 
sented to  promise.  It's  a  gratifying  circumstance,  that 
you  '11  be  glad  to  hear,  that  a  young  and  lovely  girl  is 
growing  into  a  woman  expressly  on  my  account,  and  is 
now  saving  up  for  me."  Dick's  imaginative  vanity 


74  NOVELS  AND  NOVELISTS  : 

absolutely  deceives  his  own  senses.  He  calls  a  fight,  in 
which  his  own  face  is  damaged,  a  festive  scene ;  he  asks 
his  companion  in  punch  to  pass  the  rosy  wine ;  he  pays 
for  his  liquor  by  solemnly  advising  the  boy  at  the  bar 
never  to  touch  spirits ;  and  tells  a  stranger,  whom  he 
designs  to  dupe,  that  the  wing  of  friendship  must  not 
moult  a  feather.  Sir  Epicure  Mammon  himself  hard\y 
realizes  with  more  fulness  his  gorgeous  visions  of  glut- 
tony and  avarice,  than  the  images  of  all  that  is  unreal  in 
dissipation  succeed  each  other  as  facts  in  poor  Dick's 
helter-skelter  brain. 

Among  the  various  characters  of  Dickens,  there  is  one 
class,  which,  disagreeing  in  many  things,  agree  in  being 
the  tormentors  of  social  life.  They  are  persons  whom 
the  law  does  not  touch,  but,  compared  with  some  of 
them,  highwaymen  may  be  considered  public  benefac- 
tors. As  ladies  always  have  the  precedence,  we  will 
pass  over  the  currish  attorney,  Brass,  and  the  coarse 
scoundrel,  Squeers;  the  snapping,  hissing  hatred  of 
Quilp,  and  the  creamy  villany  of  Pecksniff;  in  order  to 
do  fit  honor  to  that  miracle  of  mingled  weakness,  pru- 
dery, and  malice,  the  incomparable  Miss  Miggs.  She 
is  an  elderly  maiden,  who,  by  some  strange  neglect  on 
the  part  of  mankind,  has  been  allowed  to  remain  unmar- 
ried. This  neglect  might  in  some  small  degree  be  ac- 
counted for  by  the  fact  that  her  person  and  disposition 


CHARLES    DICKENS.  75 

came  within  the  range  of  Mr.  Tappertit's  epithet  of 

"scraggy."      She  had  various  ways  of  wreaking  her 

• 
hatred  upon  the  other  sex,  the  most  cruel  of  which  waa 

in  often  honoring  them  with  her  company  and  discourse, 
Her  feeling  for  the  wrongs  of  woman  was  deep  and 
strong,  and  she  had  been  known  to  wish  that  the  whole 
race  would  die  off,  that  men  might  be  brought  to  appre- 
ciate the  real  value  of  the  blessings  by  which  they  set 
so  little  store ;  and  averred,  "  if  she  could  obtain  a  fair 
round  number  of  virgins,  say  ten  thousand,  to  follow  her 
example,  she  would,  to  spite  mankind,  hang,  drown,  stab, 
or  poison  herself,  with  a  joy  past  expression."  When 
she  watches  at  the  window  for  the  return  of  Sim  Tap- 
pertit,  with  the  intention  of  betraying  him,  she  is  de- 
scribed as  "having  an  expression  of  face  in  which  a 
great  number  of  opposite  ingredients,  such  as  mischief, 
cunning,  malice,  triumph,  and  patient  expectation,  were 
all  mixed  up  together  in  a  kind  of  physiognomical 
punch ;"  and  as  composing  herself  to  wait  and  listen, 
"  like  some  fair  ogress,  who  has  set  a  trap,  and  was 
waiting  for  a  nibble  from  a  plump  young  traveller." 
Dickens,  in  this  character,  well  represents  how  such 
seemingly  insignificant  malignants  as  Miss  Miggs  can 
become  the  pest  of  families  ;  and  that,  though  full  of 
weakness  and  malignity,  they  can  be  proud  of  their  vir- 


76  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

tue  and  religion,  and  make  slander  the  prominent  ele- 
ment of  their  pious  conversation. 

Few  novelists  excel  in  the  finer  shades  of  character, 
in  the  exhibition  of  those  minor  'traits  which  the  eye  of 
genius  alone  can  detect.  Much  of  the  most  refined 
humor  of  Dickens  comes  from  his  insight  into  the  subtle- 
ties of  the  ludicrous.  This  penetration  of  vision  is  often 
shown  when  the  humor  seems  broad  even  to  farcical 
excess,  and  especially  when  he  makes  a  transparent 
hypocrite  speak  as  if  he  were  playing  a  deep  game. 
Squeers,  for  instance,  is  a  thoroughly  vulgar  rascal,  but 
he  has  a  dim  sense  that  some  men  are  swayed  by  moral 
and  sympathetic  considerations,  and  he  accordingly 
adopts  what  he  deems  the  language  of  virtue  and  reli- 
gion when  he  intends  some  peculiarly  infamous  trick. 
His  mode  of  translating  morality  and  affection  into  his 
own  vocabulary  of  villany  is  richly  ludicrous.  When 
his  hopeful  son,  Master  Wackford  Squeers,  catches  poor 
Smike,  the  exulting  parent  exclaims,  —  "You  always 
keep  on  the  same  path,  and  do  things  that  you  see 
your  father  do,  and  when  you  die  you  will  go  right  slap 
to  heaven,  and  be  asked  no  questions."  Snawley  and 
Squeers  know  each  other  to  be  scoundrels,  yet  they  ever 
preserve  in  their  colloquies  a  clumsy  affectation  of  senti- 
ment and  conscience.  Snawley,  who  is  hired  to  entrap 
poor  Smike,  effects  his  purpose  by  claiming  the  boy  as 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  77 

his  son.  When  he  meets  Squeers  he  indulges  in  a  com- 
mendable strain  of  snivelling  eloquence  on  the  beauty  </ 
natural  affection.  "  It  only  shows  what  natur  is,  sir," 
said  Mr.  Squeers.  "  She 's  a  rum  'un,  is  natur." — "  She 
is  a  holy  thing,"  murmured  Snawley. — "I  believe  you," 
added  Mr.  Squeers,  with  a  moral  sigh ;  "  I  should  like 
to  know  how  we  could  get  along  without  her.  Natur," 
he  said,  growing  solemn,  "  is  more  easily  conceived  than 
described.  0  !  what  a  blessed  thing,  sir,  to  be  in  a  state 
of  natur." 

Brass,  in  the  Old  Curiosity  Shop,  a  knave  com- 
pounded of  hawk  and  puppy,  who  fawns,  cheats,  and 
sentimentalizes  through  the  whole  book,  has  become  so 
accustomed  to  this  grotesque  affectation  of  excellence, 
that  it  always  flows  from  his  lips  when  he  speaks  with- 
out reflection.  He  lays  a  trap  to  make  poor  Kit  Nubbles 
appear  a  thief,  and  really  appears  measurelessly  horror- 
stricken  when  the  money  is  found  in  the  boy's  posses- 
sion. "  And  this,"  he  cries,  clasping  his  hands,  "  this  is 
the  world,  that  turns  upon  its  own  axis,  and  has  lunar 
influences,  and  revolutions  round  hea-^nly  bodies,  and 
various  games  of  that  sort !  This  is  human  natur,  is 
it?"  Pecksniff,  again,  is  so  thoroughly  impregnated 
with  the  spirit  of  falsehood,  that  he  is  moral  even  in 
drunkenness,  and  canting  even  in  shame  and  discovery. 

Much  of  the  humor  of  Dickens  is  identical  with  his 


78  NOVELS   AND   NOVELISTS  : 

style.  In  this  the  affluence  of  his  fancy  in  suggestive 
phrases  and  epithets  is  finely  displayed ;  and  he  often 
flashes  the  impression  of  a  character  or  a  scene  upon  the 
min4  by  a  few  graphic  verbal  combinations.  When 
Ralph  Nickleby  says  "  God  bless  you,"  to  his  nephew, 
"  the  words  stick  in  his  thoat,  as  if  unused  to  the  pas- 
sage." When  Tigg  clasped  Mr.  Pecksniff  in  the  dark, 
that  worthy  gentleman  "  found  himself  collared  by  some- 
thing which  smelt  like  several  damp  umbrellas,  a  barrel 
of  beer,  a  cask  of  warm  brandy  and  water,  and  a  small 
parlor  full  of  tobacco-smoke,  mixed."  Mrs.  lodgers, 
when  she  desires  to  make  Ruth  Pinch  know  her  station, 
surveys  her  with  a  look  of  "genteel  grimness."  A 
widow  of  a  deceased  brother  of  Martin  Chuzzlewit  is 
described  as  one,  who,  "  being  almost  supernaturally  dis- 
agreeable, and  having  a  dreary  face,  a  bony  figure,  and  a 
masculine  voice,  was,  in  right  of  these  qualities,  called  a 
strong-minded  woman."  Mr.  Richard  Swiveller  no 
sooner  enters  a  room  than  the  nostrils  of  the  company 
are  saluted  by  a  strong  smell  of  gin  and  lemon-peel. 
Mr.  George  Chuzzlewit,  a  person  who  over-fed  himself, 
is  sketched  as  a  gentleman  with  such  an  obvious  dispo- 
sition to  pimples,  that  "  the  bright  spots  on  his  cravat, 
the  rich  pattern  of  his  waistcoat,  and  even  his  glittering 
trinkets,  seemed  to  have  broken  out  upon  him,  and  not 
to  have  come  into  existence  comfortably."  Felicities  like 


CHARLES    DICKENS.  79 

these,  Dickens  squanders  with  a  prodigality  which  re- 
duces their  relative  value,  and  makes  the  generality  of 
style-mongers  poor  indeed. 

It  is  difficult  to  say  whether  Dickens  is  more  success- 
ful in  humor  or  pathos.  Many  prefer  his  serious  to  his 
coaiic  scenes.  It  is  certain  that  his  genius  can  as  read- 
ily draw  tears  as  provoke  laughter,  Sorrow,  want,  pov- 
erty, pain,  and  death ;  the  affections  which  cling  to  earth 
and  those  which  rise  above  it ;  he  represents  always 
with  power,  and  often  with  marvellous  skill.  His  style, 
in  the  serious  moods  of  his  mind,  has  a  harmony  of  flow 
which  often  glides  unconsciously  into  metrical  arrange- 
ment ;  and  is  full  of  those  words 

"  Which  fall  as  soft  as  snow  on  the  sea, 
And  melt  in  the  heart  as  instantly." 

One  source  of  his  pathos  is  the  intense  and  purified  con- 
ception he  has  of  moral  beauty,  of  that  beauty  which 
comes  from  a  thoughtful  brooding  over  the  most  solemn 
and  affecting  realities  of  life.  The  character  of  little 
Nell  is  an  illustration.  The  simplicity  of  this  creation, 
framed  as  it  is  from  the  finest  elements  of  human  nature, 
and  the  unambitious  mode  of  its  development  through 
the  motley  scenes  ^  of  the  Old  Curiosity  Shop,  are  calcu- 
lated to  make  us  overlook  its  rare  merit  as  a  work  of 
high  poetic  genius.  Amid  the  wolfish  malignity  of 
Quilp,  the  sugared  meanness  of  Brass,  the  roaring  con- 


80  NOVELS    AND   NOVELISTS  : 

Triviality  of  Swiveller,  amid  scenes  of  selfishness  and 
shame,  of  passion  and  crime,  this  delicate  creation  moves 
along,  unsullied,  purified,  pursuing  the  good  in  the  sim- 
ple earnestness  of  a  pure  heart,  gliding  to  the  tomb  as  to 
a  sweet  sleep,  and  leaving  in  every  place  that  her  pres- 
ence beautifies  the  marks  of  celestial  footprints.  Sor- 
rows such  as  hers,  over  which  so  fine  a  sentiment  sheds 
its  consecrations,  have  been  well  said  to  be  ill-bartered 
for  the  garishness  of  joy  ;  "  for  they  win  us  softly  from 
life,  and  fit  us  to  die  smiling." 

In  addition  to  this  refined  perception  of  moral  beauty, 
he  has  great  tragic  power.  It  would  be  useless,  in  our 
limits,  to  attempt  to  give  illustrations  of  his  closeness  to 
nature  in  delineating  the  deeper  passions  ;  his  profound 
observation  of  the  workings  of  the  soul  when  stained 
with  crime  and  looking  forward  to  death ;  his  skill  in 
gifting  remorse,  fear,  avarice,  hatred  and  revenge,  with 
their  appropriate  language ;  and  his  subtle  appreciation 
of  the  influence  exercised  by  different  moods  of  the  mind 
in  modifying  the  appearances  of  external  objects.  In 
these  the  poet  always  appears  through  the  novelist,  and 
we  hardly  know  whether  imagination  or  observation  con- 
tributes most  to  the  effect. 

In  closing  these  desultory  remarks  on  Dickens,  and 
the  department  of  literature  of  which  he  is  the  greatest 
living  representative,  it  may  not  be  irrelevant  to  express 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  81 

a  regret  that  we  have  not  a  class  of  novels  illustrative  jf 
American  life  and  character,  which  does  some  justice  to 
both.  Novelists  we  have  in  perilous  abundance,  as 
Egypt  had  locusts ;  some  of  them  unexcelled  in  the  art 
of  preparing  a  dish  of  fiction  by  a  liberal  admixture  of 
the  horrible  and  sentimental ;  and  some  few  who  display  • 
talents  and  accomplishments  of  a  higher  order;  but  a 
series  of  national  novels,  illustrative  of  the  national  life, 
the  production  of  men  penetrated  with  an  American 
spirit,  without  being  Americanisms,  we  can  hardly  plume 
ourselves  upon  possessing.  The  American  has  hereto- 
fore appeared  in  romance  chiefly  to  be  libeled  or  cari- 
catured. He  has  been  represented  as  an  acute  knave, 
expressing  the  sentiments  of  a  worldling  in  the  slang  of 
an  ale-house,  and  principally  occupied  in  peddling  Con- 
necticut nutmegs,  wooden  clocks,  and  tin  ware.  That 
Sam  Slick,  Nimrod  Wildfire,  and  the  Ethiopian  Min- 
strels, do  not  comprehend  the  whole  wealth  and  raciness 
of  life  as  it  is  in  the  North,  the  South,  and  the  West, 
might  easily  be  demonstrated  if  a  man  of  power  would 
undertake  the  task.  But  one  would  almost  suppose, 
from  hearing  the  usual  despairing  criticism  of  the  day, 
that  in  the  United  States  the  national  novel  was  an 
impossible  creation.  Are  there,  then,  no  materials  here 
for  the  romantic  and  heroic,  —  nothing  over  which  poe- 
try can  lovingly  hover,  —  nothing  of  sorrow  for  pathos  to 
6 


82  NOVELS    AND   NOVELISTS  . 

convert  into  beauty,  —  no  fresh  individualities  of  disposi- 
tion over  which  humor,  born  of  pathos,  can  pour  its 
floods  of  genial  mirth,  —  no  sweet  household  ties,  no 
domestic  affections,  no  high  thoughts,  no  great  passions, 
no  sorrow,  sin,  and  death  ?  Has  our  past  no  story  to 
tell  ?  Is  there  nothing  of  glory  in  the  present,  nothing 
of  hope  in  the  future  ?  In  no  country,  indeed,  is  there  a 
broader  field  opened  to  the  delineator  of  character  and 
manners  than  in  our  own  land.  Look  at  our  society, 
the  only  society  where  the  whole  people  are  alive, — 
alive  with  intelligence  and  passion,  —  every  man's  indi- 
vidual life  mingling  with  the  life  of  the  nation,  —  ava- 
rice, cruelty,  pride,  folly,  ignorance,  in  a  ceaseless  con- 
test with  great  virtues,  and  noble  aims,  and  thoughts 
that  reach  upward  to  the  ideal.  In  the  noise  and  tumult 
of  that  tremendous  struggle,  a  man  of  genius  not  blinded 
by  its  dust  or  deafened  by  its  din,  at  once  an  actor  in 
life  and  a  spectator  of  it,  might  discover  the  materials  of 
the  deepest  tragedy  and  the  finest  and  broadest  humor  ; 
might  hear,  amid  the  roar  and  confusion,  the  "  still,  sad 
music  of  humanity ;"  might  see,  through  all  the  rancor 
and  madness  of  partisan  warfare,  the  slow  evolution  of 
right  principles  ;  might  send  his  soul  along  that  tide  of 
impetuous  passion  in  which  novelties  are  struggling  with 
prejudices,  without  being  overwhelmed  in  its  foaming 
flood;  and  in  the  comprehensive  grasp  of  his  intellect 


CHARLES   DICKENS.  83 

might  include  all  classes,  all  sects,  all  professions,  mak- 
ing them  stand  out  on  his  luminous  page  in  the  clear 
light  of  reality,  doing  justice  to  all  by  allowing  each  its 
own  costume  and  language,  compelling  Falsehood  to 
give  itself  the  lie,  and  Pride  to  stand  abased  before  its 
own  image,  and  guided  in  all  his  pictures  of  life  and 
character  by  a  spirit  at  once  tolerant,  just,  generous, 
humane,  and  national. 


WIT  AM)  HUMOR* 


IT  has  been  justly  objected  to  New  England  society, 
that  it  is  too  serious  and  prosaic.  It  cannot  take  a  joke. 
It  demands  the  reason  of  all  things,  or  their  value  in  the 
current  coin  of  the  land.  It  is  nervous,  fidgety,  unre- 
posing,  full  of  trouble.  Striving  hard  to  make  even  reli- 
gion a  torment,  it  clothes  in  purple  and  fine  linen  its 
apostles  of  despair.  Business  is  followed  with  such  a 
devouring  intensity  of  purpose,  that  it  results  as  often  in 
dyspepsia  as  in  wealth.  We  are  so  overcome  with  the 
serious  side  of  things,  that  our  souls  rarely  come  out  in 
irrepressible  streams  of  merriment.  The  venerable  King 
Cole  would  find  few  subjects  here  to  acknowledge  his 
monarchy  of  mirth.  In  the  foppery  of  our  utilitarianism, 
we  would  frown  down  all  recreations  which  have  not  a 
logical  connection  with  mental  improvement  or  purse 
improvement.  For  those  necessary  accompaniments  of 

*  Delivered  before  the  Boston  Mercantile  Library  Association, 
December,  1845. 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  CO 

all  life  out  of  the  Insane  Asylum,  —  qualities  which  the 
most  serious  and  sublime  of  Christian  poets  has  described 
with  the  utmost  witchery  of  his  fancy,  — 

"Quips,  and  cranks,  and  wanton  wiles, 
Nods,  and  becks,  and  wreathed  smiles, 
Sport,  that  wrinkled  Care  derides, 
And  Laughter  holding  both  his  sides,"  — 

for  these  we  have  the  suspicious  glance,  the  icy  speech, 
the  self-involved  and  mysterious  look.  We  are  gulled 
by  all  those  pretences  which  require  a  vivid  sense  of  the 
ludicrous  to  be  detected ;  and  with  all  our  boasted  intel- 
ligence, there  is  hardly  a  form  of  quackery  and  fanati- 
cism which  does  not  thrive  better  by  the  side  of  our 
schools  and  colleges  than  anywhere  else.  And  the 
reason  is,  we  lack  generally  the  faculty  or  feeling  of 
ridicule,  —  the  counterfeit-detector  all  over  the  world. 
We  have,  perhaps,  sufficient  respect  for  the  great,  the 
majestic,  and  the  benevolent ;  but  we  are  deficient  in  the 
humorous  insight  to  detect  roguery  and  pretence  under 
their  external  garbs.  As  we  cannot  laugh  at  our  own 
follies,  so  we  cannot  endure  being  laughed  at.  A  Grub- 
street  scribbler,  tossing  at  us  from  a  London  garret  a 
few  lightning-bugs  of  jocularity,  can  set  our  whole  pop- 
ulation in  a  flame.  Public  indignation  is  the  cheapest 
article  of  domestic  manufacture.  There  is  no  need  of  a 
tariff  to  protect  that.  We  thus  give  altogether  too  much 


86  WIT  AND   HUMOR. 

importance  to  unimportant  things,  —  breaking  butterflies 
on  the  wheel,  and  cannonading  grasshoppers ;  and  our 
dignity  continually  exhales  in  our  spasmodic  efforts  to 
preserve  it. 

Now  it  is  an  undoubted  fact  that  the  principle  of 
Mirth  is  as  innate  in  the  mind  as  any  other  original 
faculty.  The  absence  of  it,  in  individuals  or  communi- 
ties, is  a  defect ;  for  there  are  various  forms  of  error  and 
imposture  which  wit,  and  wit  alone,  can  expose  and 
punish.  Without  a  well-trained  capacity  to  perceive  the 
ludicrous,  the  health  suffers,  both  of  the  body  and  the 
mind;  seriousness  dwindles  into  asceticism,  sobriety 
degenerates  into  bigotry,  and  the  natural  order  of  things 
gives  way  to  the  vagaries  of  distempered  imaginations. 
"  He  who  laughs,"  said  the  mother  of  Goethe,  "  can  com- 
mit no  deadly  sin."  The  Emperor  Titus  thought  he  had 
lost  a  day  if  he  had  passed  it  without  laughing.  Sterne 
contends  that  every  laugh  lengthens  the  term  of  our  lives. 
Wisdom,  which  represents  the  marriage  of  Truth  and 
Virtue,  is  by  no  means  synonymous  with  gravity.  She 
is  L'AUegro  as  well  as  II  Penseroso,  and  jests  as  well 
as  preaches.  The  wise  men  of  old  have  sent  most  of 
their  morality  down  the  stream  of  time  in  the  light  skiff 
of  apothegm  or  epigram ;  and  the  proverbs  of  nations, 
which  embody  the  common-sense  of  nations,  have  the 
brisk  concussion  of  the  most  sparkling  wit.  Almost 


WIT  AND   HUMOR.  87 

every  sensible  remark  on  a  folly  is  a  witty  remark.  Wit 
is  thus  often  but  the  natural  language  of  wisdom,  view- 
ing life  with  a  piercing  and  passionless  eye.  Indeed, 
nature  and  society  are  so  replete  with  startling  contrasts, 
that  wit  often  consists  in  the  mere  statement  and  com- 
parison of  facts ;  as  when  Hume  says,  that  the  ancient 
Muscovites  wedded  their  wives  with  a  whip  instead  of  a 
ring ;  as  when  Voltaire  remarks,  that  Penn's  treaty  with 
the  Indians  was  the  only  one  ever  made  between  civil- 
ized men  and  savages  not  sanctioned  by  an  oath,  and 
the  only  one  that  ever  was  kept.  In  the  same  vein  of 
wise  sarcasm  is  the  observation  that  France  under  the 
Ancient  Kegime  was  an  absolute  monarchy  moderated 
by  songs,  and  that  Kussia  is  a  despotism  tempered  by 
assassination ;  or  the  old  English  proverb,  that  he  who 
preaches  war  is  the  devil's  chaplain. 

In  view  of  this  ludicrous  side  of  things,  perceived  by 
Wit  and  Humor,  I  propose  in  this  lecture  to  discourse 
of  Mirth,  —  its  philosophy,  its  literature,  its  influence. 
The  breadth  of  the  theme  forbids  a  complete  treatment 
of  it,  for  to  Wit  and  Humor  belong  much  that  is  impor- 
tant in  history  and  most  agreeable  in  letters.  The  mere 
mention  of  a  few  of  the  great  wits  and  humorists  of  the 
world  will  show  the  extent  of  the  subject,  viewed  simply 
in  its  literary  aspect ;  for  to  Mirth  belong  the  exhaust- 
less  fancy  and  sky-piercing  buffooneries  of  Aristophanes ; 


88  WIT   AND   HUMOR. 

the  matchless  irony  of  Lucian ;  the  stern  and  terrible 
satire  of  Juvenal ;  the  fun-drunken  extravagances  of 
.Rabelais;  the  self-pleased  chuckle  of  Montaigne;  the 
farcical  caricature  of  Scarron ;  the  glowing  and  spark- 
ling verse  of  Dryden ;  the  genial  fun  of  Addison ;  the 
scoffing  subtilties  of  Butler ;  the  aerial  merriment  of 
Sterne ;  the  hard  brilliancy  and  stinging  emphasis  of 
Pope ;  the  patient  glitter  of  Congreve ;  the  teasing 
mockery  of  Voltaire ;  the  polished  sharpness  of  Sheridan ; 
the  wise  drolleries  of  Sydney  Smith ;  the  sly,  shy,  elu- 
sive, ethereal  humor  of  Lamb ;  the  short,  sharp,  flashing 
scorn  of  Macaulay ;  the  careless  gayety  of  Beranger ; 
the  humorous  sadness  of  Hood ;  and  the  comic  creations, 
various  almost  as  human  nature,  which  have  peopled  the 
imaginations  of  Europe  with  everlasting  forms  of  the 
ludicrous,  from  the  time  of  Shakspeare  and  Cervantes 
to  that  of  Scott  and  Dickens.  Now  all  these  writers 
either  represented  or  influenced  their  age.  Their  works 
are  as  valuable  to  the  historian  as  to  the  lover  of  the 
comic ;  for  they  show  us  what  people  in  different  ages 
laughed  at,  and  thus  indicate  the  periods  at  which  forma 
of  faith  and  government,  and  social  follies  and  vices, 
passed  from  objects  of  reverence  or  respect  into  subjects 
of  ridicule  and  contempt.  And  only  in  Dr.  Barrow's 
celebrated  description  of  facetiousness,  "the  greatest 
proof  of  mastery  over  language,"  says  Mackintosh,  "ever 


WIT  AND  HUMOR.  89 

given  by  an  English  writer,"  can  be  represented  the 
manifold  forms  and  almost  infinite  range  of  their  mirth. 
"  Sometimes  it  lieth  in  pat  allusion  to  a  known  story,  or 
in  seasonable  application  of  a  trivial  saying,  or  in  forging 
an  apposite  tale  ;  sometimes  it  playeth  in  words  and 
phrases,  taking  advantage  from  the  ambiguity  of  their 
sense  or  the  affinity  of  their  sound ;  sometimes  it  is 
wrapped  up  in  a  dress  of  humorous  expression ;  some- 
times it  lurketh  under  an  odd  similitude ;  sometimes  it 
is  lodged  in  a  sly  question,  in  a  smart  answer,  in  a 
quirkish  reason,  in  a  shrewd  intimation,  in  cunningly 
diverting  or  cleverly  retorting  an  objection ;  sometimes 
it  is  couched  in  a  bold  scheme  of  speech,  in  a  tart  irony, 
in  a  lusty  hyperbole,  in  a  startling  metaphor,  in  a  plau- 
sible reconciling  of  contradictions,  or  in  acute  nonsense  ; 
sometimes  a  scenical  representation  of  persons  or  things, 
a  counterfeit  speech,  a  mimical  look  or  gesture,  passeth 
for  it;  sometimes  an  affected  simplicity,  sometimes  a 
presumptuous  bluntness,  giveth  it  being ;  sometimes  it 
riseth  only  from  a  lucky  hitting  upon  what  is  strange  ; 
sometimes  from  a  crafty  wresting  obvious  matter  to  the 
purpose.  Often  it  consisteth  in  one  hardly  knows  what, 
and  springeth  up  one  can  hardly  tell  how,  being  answer- 
able to  the  numberless  rovings  of  fancy  and  windings  of 
language." 

To  this  description,  at  once  so  subtle  and  so  compre- 


90  WIT   AND   HUMOR. 

hensive,  little  can  be  added.  It  remains,  however,  to 
indicate  some  characteristics  which  separate  wit  from 
humor.  Neither  seems  a  distinct  faculty  of  the  mind, 
but  rather  a  sportive  exercise  of  intellect  and  fancy, 
directed  by  the  sentiment  of  Mirth,  and  changing  its 
character  with  the  variations  of  individual  passions  and 
peculiarities.  The  essence  of  the  ludicrous  consists  in 
surprise,  —  in  unexpected  turns  of  feeling  and  explosions 
of  thought,  —  often  by  bringing  dissimilar  things  together 
with  a  shock;  —  as  when  some  wit  called  Boyle,  the 
celebrated  philosopher,  the  father  of  Chemistry  and 
brother  of  the  Earl  of  Cork ;  or  as  when  the  witty  editor 
of  a  penny  paper  took  for  the  motto  of  his  journal,  — 
"  The  price  of  liberty  is  eternal  vigilance,  the  price  of 
the  Star  is  only  one  cent."  "When  Northcote,  the  sculp- 
tor, was  asked  what  he  thought  of  George  the  Fourth,  he 
answered  that  he  did  not  know  him.  "  But,"  persisted 
his  querist,  "  his  majesty  says  he  knows  you."  "  Know 
me,"  said  Northcote,  "pooh!  pooh!  that's  all  his  brag!" 
Again,  Phillips,  while  travelling  in  this  country,  said 
that  he  once  met  a  republican  so  furious  against  mon- 
archs  that  he  would  not  even  wear  a  crown  to  his  hat. 
The  expression  of  uncontrolled  self-will  is  often  witty  as 
well  as  wicked,  from  this  element  of  unexpectedness. 
Peter  the  Great,  observing  the  number  of  lawyers  in 
Westminster  Hall,  remarked  that  he  had  but  two  lawyers 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  91 

in  his  whole  dominions,  and  that  he  intended  to  hang 
one  of  them  as  soon  as  he  got  home. 

Wit  was  originally  a  general  name  for  all  the  intel- 
lectual powers,  meaning  the  faculty  which  kens,  per- 
ceives, knows,  understands  ;  it  was  gradually  narrowed 
in  its  signification  to  express  merely  the  resemblance 
between  ideas ;  and  lastly,  to  note  that  resemblance 
when  it  occasioned  ludicrous  surprise.  It  marries  ideas, 

lying  wi(Je  apart,  by  a  sudden  jerk  of  the  understanding. 

%^~ " 

Humor  originally  meant  moisture,  a  signification  it  met- 
aphorically retains,  for  it  is  the  very  juice  of  the  mind, 
oozing  from  the  brain,  and  enriching  and  fertilizing 
wherever  it  falls.  Wit  exists  by  antipathy ;  Humor  by 
sympathy.  Wit  laughs  at  things ;  Humor  laughs  with 
them.  Wit  lashes  external  appearances,  or  cunningly 
exaggerates  single  foibles  into  character ;  Humor  glides 
into  the  heart  of  its  object,  looks  lovingly  on  the  infirmi- 
ties it  detects,  and  represents  the  whole  man.  Wit  is 
abrupt,  darting,  scornful,  and  tosses  its  analogies  in  your 
face ;  Humor  is  slow  and  shy,  insinuating  its  fun  into 
your  heart.  Wit  is  negative,  analytical,  destructive ; 
Humor  is  creative.  The  couplets  of  Pope  are  witty,  but 
Sancho  Panza  is  a  humorous  creation.  Wit,  when 
earnest,  has  the  earnestness  of  passion,  seeking  to  de- 
stroy ;  Humor  has  the  earnestness  of  affection,  and  would 
lift  up  what  is  seemingly  low  into  our  charity  and  love. 


92  WIT   AND   HTJMOR. 

"Wit,  bright,  rapid  and  blasting  as  the  lightning,  flashes, 
strikes  and  vanishes,  in  an  instant ;  Humor,  warm  and 
all-embracing  as  the  sunshine,  bathes  its  objects  in  a 
genial  and  abiding  light.  Wit  implies  hatred  or  con- 
tempt of  folly  and  crime,  produces  its  effects  by  brisk 
shocks  of  surprise,  uses  the  whip  of  scorpions  and  the 
branding-iron,  stabs,  stings,  pinches,  tortures,  goads, 
teases,  corrodes,  undermines ;  Humor  implies  a  sure 
conception  of' the  beautiful,  the  majestic  and  the  true,  by 
whose  light  it  surveys  and  shapes  their  opposites.  It  is 
an  humane  influence,  softening  with  mirth  the  ragged 
inequalities  of  existence,  promoting  tolerant  views  of  life, 
bridging  over  the  spaces  which  separate  the  lofty  from 
the  lowly,  the  great  from  the  humble.  Old  Dr.  Fuller's 
remark,  that  a  negro  is  "  the  image  of  God  cut  in  ebony," 
is  humorous ;  Horace  Smith's  inversion  of  it,  that  the 
taskmaster  is  "  the  image  of  the  devil  cut  in  ivory,"  is 
witty.  Wit  can  coexist  with  fierce  and  malignant  pas- 
sions ;  but  Humor  demands  good  feeling  and  fellow-feel- 
ing, feeling  not  merely  for  what  is  above  us,  but  for  what 
is  around  and  beneath  us.  When  Wit  and  Humor  are 
commingled,  the  result  is  a  genial  sharpness,  dealing 
with  its  object  somewhat  as  old  Izaak  Walton  dealt  with 
the  irog  he  used  for  bait,  —  running  the  hook  neatly 
through  his  mouth  and  out  at  his  gills,  and  in  so  doing 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  93 

"  using  him  as  though  he  loved  him  ! "     Sydney  Smith 
and  Shakspeare's  Touchstone  are  examples. 

Wit,  then,  being  strictly  an  assailing  and  destructive 
faculty,  remorselessly  shooting  at  things  from  an  antag- 
onist point  of  view,  it  not  infrequently  blends  with  great 
passions ;  and  you  ever  find  it  gleaming  in  the  van  of 
all  radical  and  revolutionary  iii^ nts  against  estab- 
lished opinions  and  institutions.  In  this  practical,  exe- 
cutive form,  it  is  commonly  called  Satire  ,•*  and  in  this 
form  it  has  exercised  vast  influence  on  human  affairs. 
Its  character  has  varied  with  the  character  of  individual 
satirists ;  in  some  taking  the  beak  and  talons  of  the 
eagle  or  the  hawk,  in  others  putting  on  the  wasp  and  the 
dragon-fly.  Too  often  it  has  but  given  a  brighter  and 
sharper  edge  to  hatred  and  malignity.  In  a  classifica- 
tion of  satirical  compositions,  they  may  be  included  in 
two  great  divisions,  namely,  satire  on  human  nature,  and 
satire  on  the  perversions  and  corruptions  of  human 
nature.  The  first  and  most  terrible  of  these,  satire  on 
human  nature,  dipping  its  pen  in  "  Scorn's  fiery  poison," 
represents  man  as  a  bundle  of  vices  and  weaknesses, 
considers  his  aspirations  merely  as  provocatives  of  malig- 
nant scoffing,  and  debases  whatever  is  most  beautiful 
and  majestic  in  life,  by  associating  it  with  whatever  is 
vilest  and  most  detestable.  This  is  not  satire  on  men, 
but  on  Man.  The  laughter  which  it  creates  is  impish 


94  WIT   AND  HUMOR. 

and  devilish,  the  very  mirth  of  fiends,  and  its  wit  the 
gleam  and  glare  of  infernal  light.  Two  great  dramatists, 
Shakspeare  and  Goethe,  have  represented  this  phase  of 
satire  artistically,  in  the  characters  of  lago  and  Mephis- 
topheles  ;  and  Dean  Swift  and  Lord  Byron  have  done  it 
personally,  in  Gulliver  and  Don  Juan ;  —  Swift,  from  fol- 
lowing the  instincts  of  a  diseased  heart,  and  the  analo- 
gies of  an  impure  fancy ;  Byron,  from  recklessness  and 
capricious  misanthropy.  Only,  however,  in  lago  and 
Mephistopheles  do  we  find  the  perfection  of  this  kind  of 
wit,  —  keen,  nimble,  quick-sighted,  feelingless,  under- 
mining all  virtue  and  all  beauty  with  foul  suspicions  and 
fiendish  mockeries.  The  subtle  mind  of  lago  glides. to 
its  object  with  the  soft  celerity  of  a  panther's  tread ;  that 
of  Mephistopheles  darts  with  the  velocity  of  a  tiger's 
spring.  Both  are  malignant  intelligences,  infinitely 
ingenious  in  evil,  infinitely  merciless  in  purpose ;  and 
wherever  their  scorching  sarcasm  falls,  it  blights  and 
blackens  all  the  humanities  of  life 

Now  for  this  indiscriminate  jibing  and  scoffing  at  hu- 
man nature  there  can  be  no  excuse.  There  is  no  surer 
sign  of  a  bad  heart  than  for  a  writer  to  find  delight  in 
degrading  his  species.  But  still  there  are  legitimate 
objects  for  the  most  terrible  and  destructive  weapons  of 
satire ;  and  these  are  the  corruptions  and  crimes  of  the 
world,  whether  embodied  in  persons  or  institutions. 


WIT  AND  HUMOR.  95 

Here  wit  has  achieved  great  victories,  victories  for  hu- 
manity and  truth.  Brazen  impudence  and  guilt  have 
been  discrowned  and  blasted  by  its  bolts.  It  has  over- 
thrown establishments  where  selfishness,  profligacy  and 
meanness,  had  hived  for  ages.  It  has  felt  its  way  in 
flame  along  every  nerve  and  artery  of  social  oppressors, 
whose  tough  hearts  had  proved  invulnerable  to  wail  and 
malediction.  It  has  torn  aside  the  masks  which  have 
given  temporary  ascendency  to  every  persecutor  calling 
himself  Priest,  and  every  robber  calling  himself  King. 
It  has  scourged  the  bigot  and  the  hypocrite,  and  held  up 
to  "grinning  infamy"  the  knaveries  and  villanies  of 
corrupt  governments.  It  has  made  many  a  pretension 
of  despotism,  once  unquestioned,  a  hissing  and  a  by-word 
all  over  the  earth.  Tyrannies,  whose  iron  pressure  had 
nearly  crushed  out  the  life  of  a  people,  —  tyrannies, 
which  have  feared  neither  man  nor  God,  and  withstood 
prayers  and  curses  which  might  almost  have  brought 
down  Heaven's  answering  lightnings,  —  these,  in  the 
very  bravery  of  their  guilt,  in  the  full  halloo  of  their 
whole  pack  of  unbridled  passions,  have  been  smitten  by 
the  shaft  of  the  satirist,  and  passed  from  objects  of  hatred 
and  terror  into  targets  of  ridicule  and  scorn.  As  men 
neither  fear  nor  respect  what  has  been  made  contempti- 
ble, all  honor  to  him  who  makes  oppression  laughable  as 
well  as  detestable.  Armies  cannot  protect  it  then ;  and 


96  \V1T   AND   HTTMOR. 

walls  which  have  remained  impenetrable  to  cannon  have 
fallen  before  a  roar  of  laughter  or  a  hiss  of  contempt. 

Satirists  generally  appear  in  the  dotage  of  opinions 
and  institutions,  when  the  state  has  become  an  embodied 
falsehood,  and  the  church  a  name ;  when  society  has 
dwindled  into  a  smooth  lie,  and  routine  has  become 
religion  ;  when  appearance  has  taken  the  place  of  reality, 
and  wickedness  has  settled  down  into  weakness.  If  we 
take  the  great  comic  writers  who  represent  their  age,  we 
shall  find  that  satire,  with  them,  is  the  expression  of 
their  contempt  for  the  dead  forms  of  a  once  living  faith. 
Faith  in  Paganism  at  the  time  of  Homer  as  contrasted 
with  the  time  of  Aristophanes,  —  faith  in  Catholicism  in 
Dante's  age  as  contrasted  with  the  age  of  Voltaire,  — 
faith  in  the  creations  of  the  imagination  at  the  time  of 
Spenser  as  contrasted  with  the  age  of  Pope,  —  in  some 
degree  measure  the  difference  between  these  writers,  and 
explain  why  the  ridicule  of  the  one  should  be  pitched  at 
what  awakened  the  reverence  of  the  other.  Great  satir- 
ists, appearing  in  the  decay  of  an  old  order  of  civiliza- 
tion, descend  on  their  time  as  ministers  of  vengeance, 
intellectual  Alarics,  "  planetary  plagues," 

"  When  Jove 

Shall  o'er  some  high-viced  city  hang  his  poison 
In  the  sick  air." 

They  prepare  the  way  for  better  things  by  denouncing 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  97 

what  has  become  worn,  and  wasted,  and  corrupt,  —  that 
from  the  terrible  wreck  of  old  falsehoods  may  spring 
"  truths  that  wake  to  perish  never."  With  invincible 
courage  they  do  their  work,  and  wherever  they  see 
accredited  hypocrisy  or  shameless  guilt,  they  will  speak 

to  it, 

"  Though  Hell  itself  should  gape, 

And  bid  them  hold  their  peace." 

Thus'  we  shall  find  that  many  satirists  have  been  radi- 
cal legislators,  and  that  many  jests  have  become  history. 
The  annals  of  the  eighteenth  century  would  be  very  im- 
perfect that  did  not  give  a  large  space  to  Voltaire,  who 
was  as  much  a  monarch  as  Charles  the  Twelfth  or  Louis 
the  Fourteenth.  Satirical  compositions,  floating  about 
among  a  people,  have  more  than  once  produced  revolu- 
tions. They  are  sown  as  dragon's  teeth ;  they  spring  up 
armed  men.  The  author  of  the  ballad  of  Lilliburlero 
boasted  that  he  had  rhymed  King  James  the  Second  out 
of  his  dominions.  England,  under  Charles  II.,  was 
governed  pretty  equally  by  roues  and  wit-snappers.  A 
joke  hazarded  by  royal  lips  on  a  regal  object  has  some- 
times plunged  kingdoms  into  war ;  for  dull  monarchs 
generally  make  their  repartees  through  the  cannon's 
mouth.  The  biting  jests  of  Frederick  the  Great  on  the 
Empress  Elizabeth  and  Madame  de  Pompadour  were 
instrumental  in  bringing  down  upon  his  dominions  the 
7 


98  WIT   AND   HUMOR. 

armies  of  Russia  and  France.  The  downfall  of  the 
French  monarchy  was  occasioned  primarily  by  its  becom- 
ing contemptible  through  its  vices.  No  government, 
whether  evil  or  good,  can  long  exist  after  it  has  ceased 
to  excite  respect  and  begun  to  excite  hilarity.  Ministers 
of  state  have  been  repeatedly  laughed  out  of  office. 
Where  Scorn  points  its  scoffing  finger,  Servility  itself 
may  well  be  ashamed  to  fawn.  In  this  connection,  I 
trust  no  one  will  consider  me  capable  of  making  a  politi- 
cal allusion,  or  to  be  wanting  in  respect  for  the  dead,  if 
I  refer  in  illustration  to  a  late  administration  of  our  own 
government,  —  I  mean  that  which  retired  on  the  fourth 
of  March,  1845.  Now,  during  that  administration  meas- 
ures of  the  utmost  importance  were  commenced  or  con- 
summated ;  the  country  was  more  generally  prosperous 
than  it  had  been  for  years ;  there  were  no  spectacles  of 
gentlemen  taking  passage  for  France  or  Texas,  with 
bags  of  the  public  gold  in  their  valises ;  the  executive 
power  was  felt  in  every  part  of  the  land ;  and  yet  the 
whole  thing  was  hailed  with  a  shout  of  laughter,  ringing 
to  the  remotest  villages  of  the  east  and  the  west.  Every- 
body laughed,  and  the  only  difference  between  its  nomi- 
nal supporters  and  its  adversaries  was.  that  whereas  one 
party  laughed  outright,  the  other  laughed  in  their 
sleeves.  Nothing  could  have  saved  such  an  administra- 
tion from  downfall,  for  whatever  may  have  been  its 


WIT    AJVD   HUMOR. 


99 


intrinsic  merits,  it  was  still  considered  not  so  much  a 
government  as  a  gigantic  joke. 

And  now,  in  further  illustration  of  the  political  impor- 
tance of  satirists,  and  their  appearance  in  periods  of 
national  degradation,  allow  me  to  present  a  few  leaves 
from  literary  history.  The  great  satirical  age  of  Eng- 
lish literature,  as  you  are  all  aware,  dates  from  the  resto- 
ration e£  Charles  II.,  in  1660,  and  runs  to  the  reign  of 
George  II.,  a  period  of  about  seventy  years.  During 
this  period  nourished  Dry  den,  Pope,  Swift,  Young,  Gay, 
and  Arbuthnot,  and  during  this  period  the  national  mo- 
rality was  at  its  lowest  ebb.  It  was  an  age  peculiarly 
calculated  to  develop  an  assailing  spirit  in  men  of  talent, 
for  there  were  numberless  vices  which  deserved  to  be 
assailed.  Authors  moved  in,  or  very  near,  the  circle  of 
high  life  and  political  life,  in  the  full  view  of  the  follies 
and  crimes  of  both.  They  were  accustomed  to  see  Man 
in  his  artificial  state,  —  busy  in  intrigue,  pursuing  selfish 
ends  by  unscrupulous  means,  counting  virtue  and  honor 
as  ornamental  non-existences,  looking  on  »ligion  as  a 
very  good  thing  for  the  poor,  conceiving  of  poetry  as 
lying  far  back  in  tradition  or  out  somewhere  in  the  coun- 
try, hiding  his  hate  in  a  smile,  pocketing  his  infamy 
with  a  bow.  They  saw  that  the  star  of  the  earl,  the 
ermine  of  the  judge,  and  the  surplice  of  the  prelate, 
instead  of  representing  nobility,  justice  and  piety,  were 


100  WIT   AND   HUMOR. 

often  but  the  mere  badge  of  apostasy,  the  mere  livery  o 
Uberticide.  They  saw  that  every  person  seemed  to  have 
his  price,  and  that  if  a  man  ascertained  that  he  himself 
was  not  worth  buying,  he  was  perfectly  willing  to  sell 
his  sister  or  his  wife,  and  strutted  about,  after  the  sale, 
bedizened  with  infamy,  as  happy  and  as  pleasant  a  gen- 
tleman as  one  would  wish  to  meet  on  a  summer's  day. 
It  was  from  the  depth  of  such  infamy  as  this  last  that 
the  Duke  of  Marlborough  emerged,  the  first  general  of 
his  time.  In  such  a  mass  of  dissimulation,  effrontery, 
peculation,  fraud,  —  in  such  a  dearth  of  high  thoughts 
and  great  passions,  —  in  such  a  spectacle  of  moral  non- 
chalance, dignified  imbecility,  and  elegant  shamelessness, 
—  the  satirical  poet  could  find  numberless  targets  for  the 
scorn-winged  arrows  of  his  ridicule ;  could  sometimes 
feel  that  he,  too,  had  his  part  in  the  government  of  the 
country ;  and  with  honest  delight  could  often  exclaim, 
with  Pope,  — 

"  I  own  I  'm  proud  — I  must  be  proud,  to  see 
M«n  not  afraid  of  God  afraid  of  me." 

Among  these  satirists,  Pope,  of  the  age  of  Queen 
Anne,  was  by  far  the  most  independent,  unflinching  and 
merciless.  Inferior  to  Dryden,  perhaps,  in  genius,  he 
was  still  placed  in  a  position  which  rendered  him  more 
independent  of  courts  and  parties,  and  his  invective, 
unlike  that  of  Dryden,  was  shot  directly  at  crime  and 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  101 

folly,  without  respect  to  persons.  Although  he  was 
terribly  bitter  when  galled  and  goaded  by  personal  oppo- 
nents, and,  in  his  satire,  too  often  spent  his  strength 
against  mere  imbecility  and  wretchedness ;  yet,  take  him 
as  he  is,  the  great  representative  writer  of  his  time  ;  the 
uncompromising  smiter  of  powerful  guilt,  the  sturdy 
defender  of  humble  virtue  ;  the  satirist  of  dukes,  but  the 
eulogi$£  fcf  the  Man  of  Koss  ;  his  works  the  most  perfect 
specimens  of  brilliant  good  sense,  his  life  free  from  the 
servility  which  hitherto  had  disgraced  authorship ;  and 
though  charity  may  find  much  in  him  that  needs  to  be 
forgiven,  though  justice  may  even  sometimes  class  him 
with  those  moral  assassins  who  wear,  like  Cloten,  their 
daggers  in  their  mouths,  yet  still  great  merit  cannot  be 
denied  to  the  poet  and  the  man  who  scourged  hypocrisy 
and  baseness,  at  a  time  when  baseness  paved  the  way 
to  power,  and  hypocrisy  distributed  the  spoils  of  fraud. 
The  courage  exercised  by  such  a  satirist  was  by  no 
means  insignificant.  The  enmities  which  Pope  provoked 
were  almost  as  numerous  as  knaves  and  fools.  After 
the  publication  of  the  Dunciad,  he  was  generally  accom- 
panied in  the  street  by  a  huge  Irishman,  armed  with  a 
club,  so  that  if  any  lean-witted  rhymer  or  fat-fisted  mem- 
ber of  Parliament,  whom  he  had  gibbeted  with  his  sar- 
casm, desired  to  be  revenged  on  his  person,  the  brawny 
Hibernian  had  full  commission  to  conduct  that  contro- 


102  WIT   AND   HUMOR. 

wersy,  according  to  the  most  approved  logic  of  the  shil- 
Jaleh. 

The  other  great  satirist  of  the  age  of  Queen  Ar»pe 
was  Dean  Swift,  a  "  darker  and  a  fiercer  spirit "  than 
Pope,  and  one  who  has  been  stigmatized  as  "  the  apos- 
tate politician,  the  perjured  lover,  and  the  ribald  priest, 
—  a  heart  burning  with  hatred  against  the  whole  human 
race,  a  mind  richly  laden  with  images  from  the  gutter 
and  the  lazar-house."  Swift  has  been  justly  called 
the  greatest  of  libellers,  —  a  libeller  of  persons,  a  libeller 
of  human  nature,  and,  we  may  add,  a  libeller  of  himself. 
He  delighted  to  drag  all  the  graces  and  sanctities  of  life 
through  the  pools  and  puddles  of  his  own  mind,  and 
after  such  a  baptism  of  mud,  to  hold  them  up  as  speci- 
mens of  what  dreamers  called  the  inborn  beauty  of  the 
human  soul.  He  was  a  bad  man,  depraved  in  the  very 
centre  of  his  nature ;  but  he  was  still  one  of  the  greatest 
wits,  and,  after  a  fashion,  one  of  the  greatest  humorists, 
that  ever  existed.  His  most  effective  weapon  was  irony, 
a  kind  of  saturnine,  sardonic  wit,  having  the  self-posses- 
sion, complexity  and  continuity  of  humor,  without  its 
geniality ;  and,  in  the  case  of  Swift,  steeped  rather  in 
the  vitriol  of  human  bitterness  than  the  milk  of  human 
kindness.  Irony  is  an  insult  conveyed  in  the  form  of  a 
compliment ;  insinuating  the  most  galling  satire  undei 
the  phraseology  of  panegyric ;  placing  its  victim  naked 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  103 

on  a  bed  of  briars  and  thistles,  thinly  covered  with  rose- 
leaves  ;  adorning  his  brow  with  a  crown  of  gold,  which 
burns  into  his  brain  ;  teasing,  and  fretting,  and  riddling 
him  through  and  through,  with  incessant  discharges  of 
hot  shot  from  a  masked  battery ;  laying  bare  the  most 
sensitive  and  shrinking  nerves  of  his  mind,  and  then 
blandly  touching  them  with  ice,  or  smilingly  pricking 
them  JKith  needles.  Wit,  in  this  form,  cannot  be  with- 
stood, even  by  the  hardest  of  heart  and  the  emptiest  of 
head.  It  eats  and  rusts  into  its  victim.  Swift  used  it 
with  incomparable  skill,  sometimes  against  better  men 
than  himself,  sometimes  against  the  public  plunderer  and 
the  titled  knave,  the  frauds  of  quackery  and  the  abuses 
of  government.  His  morose,  mocking  and  cynical  spirit, 
combined  with  his  sharp  insight  into  practical  life,  ena- 
bled him  to  preserve  an  inimitable  coolness  of  manner, 
while  he  stated  the  most  nonsensical  or  atrocious  para- 
doxes as  if  they  were  self-evident  truisms.  He  generally 
destroyed  his  antagonists  by  ironically  twisting  their 
opinions  into  a  form  of  hideous  caricature,  and  then  set- 
ting forth  grave  mockeries  of  argument  in  their  defence  ; 
imputing,  by  inference,  the  most  diabolical  doctrines  to 
his  opponents,  and  then  soberly  attempting  to  show  that 
they  were  the  purest  offspring  of  justice  and  benevolence. 
Nothing  can  be  more  perfect  of  its  kind,  nothing  more 
vividly  suggests  the  shallowness  of  moral  and  religious 


104  wrr  AND  HUMOR. 

principle  which  characterized  his  age,  nothing  subjects 
practical  infidelity  to  an  ordeal  of  more  tormenting  and 
wasting  ridicule,  than  his  ironical  tract,  giving  a  state- 
ment of  reasons  why,  on  the  whole,  it  would  be  impolitic 
to  abolish  the  Christian  religion  in  England.  This  is 
considered  by  Mackintosh  the  finest  piece  of  irony  in  the 
English  language. 

Swift's  most  laughable  specimen  of  "  acute  nonsense" 
was  his  prophecy  that  a  certain  quack  almanac-maker, 
by  the  name  of  Partridge,  would  die  on  a  certain  day. 
Partridge,  who  was  but  little  disposed  to  die  in  order  to 
give  validity  to  the  prediction  of  a  rival  astrologer,  came 
out  exultingly  denying  the  truth  of  the  prophecy,  after 
the  period  fixed  for  his  decease,  and  not  he,  had  expired. 
Swift,  nothing  daunted,  retorted  in  another  tract,  in 
which  he  set  forth  a  large  array  of  quirkish  reasons  to 
prove  that  Partridge  was  dead,  and  ingeniously  argued 
that  the  quack's  own  testimony  to  the  contrary  could  not 
be  received,  as  he  was  too  notorious  a  liar  to  be  enti- 
tled to  belief  on  so  important  a  point. 

But  perhaps  the  most  exquisite  piece  of  irony  in  mod- 
ern literature,  and,  at  the  same  time,  the  most  terrible 
satire  on  the  misgovernment  of  Ireland,  is  Swift's  pam- 
phlet entitled,  "  A  Modest  Proposal  to  the  Public,  for 
Preventing  the  Children  of  Poor  People  in  Ireland  from 
being  a  Burden  to  their  Country,  and  for  making  them 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  105 

Beneficial  to  the  Public  ;"  —  which  modest  proposal  con- 
sisted in  advising  that  the  said  children  be  used  for  food. 
He  commences  with  stating  that  the  immense  number 
of  children  in  the  arms,  or  on  the  backs,  or  at  the  heels, 
of  their  starving  mothers,  has  become  a  public  grievance, 
and  that  he  would  be  a  public  benefactor  who  should 
contrive  some  method  of  making  them  useful  to  the  com- 
monwealth. After  showing  that  it  is  impossible  to  ex 
pect  tliat  they  should  be  able  to  pick  up  a  livelihood  by 
stealing  much  before  they  are  six  years  old,  and  saying 
that  he  had  been  assured  by  merchants  that  a  child 
under  twelve  years  was  no  saleable  commodity,  —  that 
it  would  not  bring  on  'change  more  than  three  pounds, 
while  its  rags  and  nutriments  would  cost  four  times  that 
amount, — he  proceeds  to  advise  their  use  as  food  for  their 
more  fortunate  fellow-creatures  ;  and  as  this  food,  from 
its  delicacy,  would  be  somewhat  dear,  he  considers  it  all 
the  more  proper  for  landlords,  who,  as  they  have  already 
devoured  the  parents,  seem  to  have  the  best  right  to  the 
children.  He  answers  all  objections  to  his  proposal  by 
mock  arguments,  and  closes  with  solemnly  protesting  his 
own  disinterestedness  in  making  it  j  and  proves  that  he 
has  no  personal  interest  in  the  matter,  as  he  has  not 
himself  a  child  by  whom  he  can  expect  to  get  a  penny, 
the  youngest  being  nine  years  old  !  So  admirably  was 
the  irony  sustained,  that  the  pamphlet  was  quoted  by  a 


106  WIT   AND   HUMOR. 

French  writer  of  the  time,  as  evidencing  the  hopeless 
barbarity  of  the  English  nation. 

It  would  be  easy  to  trace  the  influence  of  satirical 
compositions  further  down  the  course  of  English  history; 
but  enough  has  already  been  said  to  indicate  the  check 
which  social  and  political  criminals  have  received,  from 
the  presence  of  men  capable  of  holding  them  up  to  the 
world's  laughter  and  contempt.  This  satire,  in  all  free 
commonwealths,  has  a  share  in  the  legislation  and  policy 
of  the  government ;  and  bad  institutions  and  pernicious 
opinions  rarely  fall,  until  they  have  been  pierced  by  its 
keen-edged  mockeries,  or  smitten  by  its  scathing  invec- 
tives. 

The  lighter  follies  and  infirmities  of  human  nature,  as 
seen  in  every-day  life,  have  afforded  numberless  objects 
for  light-hearted  or  vinegar-hearted  raillery,  gibe,  satire, 
banter  and  caricature.  Among  the  foibles  of  men,  Wit 
plays  and  glances,  a  tricksy  Ariel  of  the  intellect,  full  of 
mirth  and  mischief,  laughing  at  all,  and  inspiring  all  to 
laugh  at  each  other.  Egotism  and  vanity  are  promi- 
nent provocations  of  this  dunce-demolishing  fun ;  for  a 
man,  it  has  been  truly  said,  is  ridiculous  "  not  so  much 
for  what  he  is,  as  for  pretending  to  be  what  he  is  not." 
It  is  very  rare  to  see  a  frank  knave,  or  a  blockhead  who 
knows  himself.  The  life  of  most  men  is  passed  in  an 
attempt  to  misrepresent  themselves,  everybody  being 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  107 

bitten  by  an  ambition  to  appear  instead  of  to  be.  Ihus 
few  can  visit  sublime  scenery  without  preparing  before- 
hand the  emotions  of  wonder  and  awe  they  ought  to  feel, 
and  contriving  the  raptures  into  which  they  intend  to 
fall.  We  mourn,  make  love,  console,  sentimentalize,  in 
cant  phrases.  We  guard  with  religious  scrupulousness 
against  the  temptation  of  being  betrayed  into  a  natural 
expression  of  ourselves.  A  perception  of  the  ludicrous 
would  make  us  ashamed  of  this  self-exaggerating  foible, 
and  save  us  from  the  cuffs  and  pats  by  which  Wit  occa- 
sionally reminds  us  of  it.  "  Dr.  Parr,"  said  a  young 
student  once  to  the  old  linguist,  —  "let's  you  and  I 
write  a  book."  —  "  Very  well,"  replied  the  doctor,  "  put 
in  all  that  I  know,  and  all  that  you  don't  know,  and 
we  'd  make  a  big  one."  The  doctor  himself  was  not 
free  from  the  conceit  he  delighted  to  punish  in  others ; 
for  satire  is  apt  to  be  a  glass,  "  in  which  we  see  every 
face  but  our  own."  He  once  said,  in  a  miscellaneous 
company,  "  England  has  produced  three  great  classical 
scholars  ;  the  first  was  Bentley,  the  second  was  Person, 
and  the  third  modesty  forbids  me  to  mention."  Occa- 
sionally egotists  will  strike  rather  hard  against  each 
other,  as  in  the  case  of  the  strutting  captain  of  a  militia 
company,  who  once,  in  a  fit  of  temporary  condescension, 
invited  a  ragged  negro  to  drink  negus  with  him.  "  Oh ! 
certainly,"  rejoined  the  negro ;  "  I  'm  no*  proud  ;  I  'd  just 


108  WIT   AND   HTJMOR. 

as  lieves  drink  with  a  militia  captain  as  anybody  else." 
Dr.  Johnson  was  famous  for  smashing  the  thin  egg-shells 
of  conceit  which  partly  concealed  the  mental  impotence 
of  some  of  his  auditors.  One  of  them  once  shook  his 
head  gravely,  and  said  he  could  not  see  the  force  and 
application  of  one  of  the  doctor's  remarks.  He  was 
crushed  instantly  by  the  gruff  retort — "It  is  my  busi- 
ness, sir,  to  give  you  arguments,  not  to  give  you  brains." 
Sometimes  the  ridiculousness  of  a  remark  springs 
from  the  intense  superficiality  of  its  conventional  conceit, 
as  in  the  case  of  the  young  lady,  who,  on  being  once 
asked  what  she  thought  of  Niagara,  answered,  aiat  she 
never  had  beheld  the  falls,  but  had  always  heard  them 
highly  spoken  of.  Ignorance  which  deems  itself  pro- 
foundly wise,  is  also  exquisitely  ludicrous.  A  German 
prince  once  gave  his  subjects  a  free  constitution ;  at 
which  they  murmured  continually,  saying  that  hereto- 
fore they  had  paid  taxes  and  been  saved  the  trouble  of 
government,  but  that  now  they  were  not  only  taxed 
but  had  to  govern  themselves.  Wit  easily  unmasks  the 
hypocrisy  and  selfishness  which  underlie  loyal  and  patri- 
otic catchwords.  Parr  said  that  the  toast  "  Church  and 
King"  usually  meant  a  "  church  without  a  gospel  and  a 
king  above  the  law ; "  and  Sydney  Smith,  while  lashing 
some  tory  placemen,  ebullient  with  loyalty,  observed  that 
"  God  save  the  King"  meant  too  often,  "  God  save  my 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  109 

pension  and  my  place,  God  give  my  sisters  an  allowance 
out  of  the  privy-purse,  —  make  me  clerk  of  the  irons,  let 
me  survey  the  meltings,  let  me  live  upon  the  fruits  of 
other  men's  industry,  and  fatten  upon  the  plunder  of  the 
public." 

Again,  all  snivelling  hypocrisy  in  speculation,  such  as 
that  which,  when  discoursing  of  the  world's  evils,  de- 
lights ,$p  call  Man's  sin  God's  providence,  —  all  boister- 

f  s 

ous  noodleism  in  reform,  whose  champions  would  take 
scciety  on  their  knee,  as  a  Yankee  takes  a  stick,  and 
whittle  it  into  shape ;  —  to  these  satire  gravitates  by  a 
natural  law.  The  story  told  by  Horace  Smith  of  the 
city  miss  is  a  good  instance  of  a  shock  given  to  affected 
and  mincing  elegance.  She  had  read  much  of  pastoral 
life,  and  once  made  a  visit  into  the  country  for  the  pur- 
pose of  communing  with  a  real  shepherd.  She  at  last 
discovered  one,  with  the  crook  in  his  hand,  the  dog  by 
his  side,  and  the  sheep  disposed  romantically  around 
him;  but  he  was  without  the  indispensable  musical 
accompaniment  of  all  poetic  shepherds,  the  pastoral  reed. 
"  Ah !  gentle  shepherd,"  softly  inquired  she,  "  tell  me 
where  's  your  pipe."  The  bumpkin  scratched  his  head, 
and  murmured  brokenly,  "  I  left  it  at  home,  miss,  'cause 
T  haint  got  no  baccy  ! " 

Wit  is  infinitely  ingenious  in  what  Barrow  calls  "  the 
quirkish  reason,"  and  often  pinches  hard  when  it  seems 


110  WIT   AND   HTTMOtt. 

most  seriously  urbane.  Thus  a  gentleman  once  warmly 
eulogized  the  constancy  of  an  absent  husband  in  the 
presence  of  his  loving  wife.  "  Yes !  yes ! "  assented  she ; 
"  he  writes  me  letters  full  of  the  agony  of  affection,  but 
he  never  remits  me  any  money."  —  "I  can  conceive  of 
that,"  replied  the  other,  "  for  I  know  his  love  to  be  unre- 
mitting." Byron's  defence  of  the  selfish  member  of  Par- 
liament is  another  pertinent  instance  : 

" has  no  heart,  you  say,  but  I  deny  it ; 

He  has  a  heart  —  he  gets  his  speeches  by  it." 

Satire  is  famous  for  these  quiet  side  cuts  and  sympa- 
thetic impertinences.  An  officer  of  Louis  XIV.  was 
continually  pestering  him  for  promotion,  and  at  last 
drew  from  him  the  peevish  exclamation  —  "  You  are  the 
most  troublesome  man  in  my  army."  —  "  That,  please 
your  majesty,  is  what  your  enemies  are  continually  say- 
ing," was  the  reply.  When  George  Wither,  the  Puritan 
poet,  was  taken  prisoner  by  the  Cavaliers,  there  was  a 
general  disposition  displayed  to  hang  him  at  once ;  but 
Sir  John  Denham  saved  his  life  by  saying  to  Charles  1. 
—  "I  hope  your  majesty  will  not  hang  poor  George 
Wither,  for  as  long  as  he  lives  it  can't  be  said  that  I  am 
the  worst  poet  in  England."  Sheridan,  it  is  well  known, 
was  never  free  from  pecuniary  embarrassments.  As  he 
was  one  day  hacking  his  face  with  a  dull  razor,  he 
turned  to  his  eldest  son,  and  said,  "  Tom,  if  you  open 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  Ill 

\ 

any  more  oysters  with  my  razor,  I  '11  cut  you  off  with  a 
shilling."  — " Very  well,  father,"  retorted  Tom,  "but 
where  will  the  shilling  come  from  ? " 

Thus  into  every  avenue  of  life  and  character  Wit 
darts  its  porcupine  quills,  —  pinching  the  pompous,  abas- 
ing the  proud,  branding  the  shameless,  knocking  out  the 
teeth  of  Pretension.  'The  foibles  and  crimes  of  men, 
indeed,  afford  perpetual  occasions  for  wit.  As  soon  as 
the  JEiuman  being  becomes  a  moral  agent,  as  soon  as  he 
has  put  off  the  vesture  of  infancy  and  been  fairly  depos- 
ited in  trowsers,  his  life  becomes  a  kind  of  tragi-comical 
caricature  of  himself.  Tetchy,  capricious,  wayward, 
inconsistent,  —  his  ideas  sparks  of  gunpowder  which 
explode  at  the  first  touch  of  fire,  —  running  the  gauntlet 
of  experience,  and  getting  cornered  at  every  step, — 
making  love  to  a  Fanny  Squeers,  thinking  her  an 
Imogen,  and  finding  her  a  Mrs.  Caudle,  —  buffeting  and 
battling  his  way  through  countless  disappointments  and 
ludicrous  surprises,  —  it  is  well  for  him  if  his  misfortunes 
of  one  year  can  constitute  his  mirth  of  the  next.  One 
thing  is  certain,  that  if  he  cannot  laugh  as  well  as  rail — 
if  he  cannot  grow  occasionally  jubilant  over  his  own 
verdancy  —  if  he  persists  pragmatically  in  referring  his 
failures  to  the  world's  injustice  instead  of  his  own  folly, 
—  he  will  end  in  moroseness  and  egotism,  in  cant  that 
snivels  and  misanthropy  that  mouths.  Even  genius  and 


112  WIT   AND  HUMOR. 

philanthropy  are  incomplete,  without  they  are  accompa- 
nied by  some  sense  of  the  ludicrous ;  for  an  extreme 
sensitiveness  to  the  evil  and  misery  of  society  becomes  a 
maddening  torture  if  not  modified  by  a  feeling  of  the 
humorous,  and  urges  its  subjects  into  morbid  exaggera- 
tions of  life's  dark  side.  Thus  many  who,  in  our  day, 
leap  headlong  into  benevolent  reforms,  merely  caricature 
philanthropy.  Blinded  by  one  idea,  they  miss  their 
mark,  dash  themselves  insanely  against  immovable 
rocks,  and  break  up  the  whole  stream  of  their  life  into 
mere  sputter  and  foam.  A  man  of  genius,  intolerant  of 
the  world's  prose,  or  incompetent  to  perceive  the  humor 
which  underlies  it,  cannot  represent  life  without  distor- 
tion and  exaggeration.  Had  Shelley  possessed  humor, 
-iis  might  have  been  the  third  name  in  English  poetry. 
The  everlasting  delight  we  take  in  Shakspeare  and 
Scott  comes  from  the  vivid  perception  they  had  of  both 
aspects  of  life,  and  their  felicitous  presentment  of  them, 
as  they  jog  against  each  other  in  the  world. 

As  Wit  in  its  practical  executive  form  usually  runs 
into  some  of  the  modifications  of  satire,  so  Humor,  which 
includes  Wit,  generally  blends  with  sympathetic  feeling. 
Humor  takes  no  delight  in  the  mere  infliction  of  pain ; 
it  has  no  connection  with  the  aggressive  or  destructive 
passions.  In  the  creation  and  delineation  of  comic  char- 
acter it  is  most  delightedly  employed,  and  here  "  Jona- 


WIT   AWD  HtJMOR.  113 

than  Wild  is  not  too  low  for  it,  nor  Lord  Shaftsbury  too 
nigh  ; "  it  deals  with  the  nicest  refinements  of  the  ludi 
crous,  and  also  with  what  Sterling  calls  the  "  trivial  and 
the  bombastic,  the  drivelling,  squinting,  sprawling  clown- 
eries of  nature,  with  her  worn  out  stage-properties  and 
rag-fair  emblazonments."  The  man  of  humor,  seeing,  at 
one  glance,  the  majestic  and  the  mean,  the  serious  and 
the  laughable  ;  indeed,  interpreting  what  is  little  or  ridic- 
ulous by  light  derived  from  its  opposite  idea  ;  delineates 
character  as  he  finds  it  in  life,  without  any  impertinent 
intrusion  of  his  own  indignation  or  approval.  He  sees 
deeply  into  human  nature ;  lays  open  the  hidden  struc- 
ture and  most  complex  machinery  of  the  mind,  and  un- 
derstands not  merely  the  motives  which  guide  actions, 
but  the  processes  by  which  they  are  concealed  from  the 
actors.  For  instance,  life  is  filled  with  what  is  called 
hypocrisy,  —  with  the  assignment  of  false  motives  to 
actions.  This  is  a  constant  source  of  the  laughable  in 
conduct.  Wit,  judging  simply  from  the  act,  treats  it  as 
a  vice,  and  holds  it  up  to  derision  or  execration ;  but 
Humor  commonly  considers  it  as  a  weakness,  deluding 
none  so  much  as  the  actor,  and  in  that  self-delusion  finds 
food  for  its  mirth.  The  character  of  old  John  Willett,  in 
Barnaby  Rudge,  so  delicious  as  a  piece  of  humor,  would 
be  but  a  barren  butt  in  the  hands  of  Wit.  Wit  cannot 
create  character.  It  might,  for  instance,  cluster  innu- 
8 


114  WIT   AND   HUMOR. 

merable  satirical  associations  around  the  abstract  idea  of 
gluttony,  but  it  could  not  picture  to  the  eye  such  a  per- 
son as  Don  Quixote's  squire.  It  cannot  create  even  a 
purely  witty  character,  such  as  Thersites,  Benedict  or 
Beatrice.  In  Congreve's  plays,  the  characters  are  not  so 
much  men  and  women  as  epigrammatic  machines,  whose 
wit,  incessant  as  a  shower  of  fiery  rain,  still  throws  no 
light  into  their  heads  or  hearts.  Now  Humor  will  have 
nothing  to  do  with  abstractions.  It  dwells  snugly  in 
concrete  personal  substances,  having  no  toleration  either 
for  the  unnaturally  low  or  the  factitiously  sublime.  It 
remorselessly  brings  down  Britannia  to  John  Bull,  Cale- 

|Qh 

donia  to  Sawney,  Hibernia  to  Paddy,  Columbia  to  Jona- 
than. It  hates  all  generalities.  A  benevolent  lady,  in  a 
work  written  to  carry  on  a  benevolent  enterprise,  com- 
mended the  project  to  the  humanity,  the  enlightened 
liberality,  the  enlarged  Christian  feeling,  of  the  British 
nation.  The  roguish  and  twinkling  eye  of  Sydney 
Smith  lighted  on  this  paragraph,  and  he  cried  out  to  her 
to  leave  all  that,  and  support  her  cause  with  ascertained 
facts.  "  The  English,"  said  he,  with  inimitable  humor, 
"  are  a  calm,  reflecting  nation  ;  they  will  give  time  and 
money  when  they  are  convinced ;  but  they  love  dates, 
names  and  certificates.  In  the  midst  of  the  most  heart- 
rending narratives,  Bull  inquires  the  day  of  the  month, 
the  year  of  our  Lord,  the  name  of  the  parish,  and  the 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  115 

countersign  of  three  or  four  respectable  householders. 
After  these  affecting  circumstances  have  been  given,  he 
can  no  longer  hold  out ;  but  gives  way  to  the  kindness 
of  his  nature,  —  puffs,  blubbers,  and  subscribes  !" 

There  is  probably  no  literature  equal  to  the  English 
in  the  number  and  variety  of  its  humorous  characters,  as 
we  find  them  in  Shakspeare,  Jonson,  Fletcher,  Fielding, 
Goldsmith,  Addison,  Scott,  and  Dickens.  There  is 
nothing  so  well  calculated  to  make  us  cheerful  and  char- 
itable, nothing  which  sinks  so  liquidly  into  the  mind, 
and  floods  it  with  such  a  rich  sense  of  mirth  and  delight, 
as  these  comic  creations.  How  they  flash  upon  our 
inward  world  of  thought,  peopling  it  with  forms  and 
faces  whose  beautiful  facetiousness  sheds  light  and 
warmth  over  our  whole  being  !  How  their  eyes  twinkle 
and  wink  with  the  very  unction  of  mirth  !  How  they 
roll  and  tumble  about  in  a  sea  of  delicious  Fun,  unwea- 
ried in  rogueries,  and  drolleries,  and  gamesome  absurdi- 
ties, and  wheedling  gibes,  and  loud-ringing  extravagant 
laughter,  —  revelling  and  rioting  in  hilarity,  —  with 
countless  jests  and  waggeries  running  and  raining  from 
them  in  a  sun-lit  stream  of  jubilant  merriment !  How 
they  flood  life  with  mirth  !  How  they  roll  up  pomposity 
and  pretence  into  great  balls  of  caricature,  and  set  them 
sluggishly  in  motion  before  our  eyes,  to  tear  the  laughter 
from  our  lungs !  How  Sir  Toby  Belch,  and  Sir  Andrew 


116  WIT  AND  HUMOR. 

Aguecheek,  and  Ancient  Pistol,  and  Captain  Bobadil, 
and  old  Tony  Weller,  tumble  into  our  sympathies! 
What  a  sneaking  kindness  we  have  for  Richard  Swivel- 
ler,  and  how  deeply  we  speculate  on  the  potential  exist- 
ence of  Mrs.  Gamp's  Mrs.  Harris  !  How  we  stow  away, 
in  some  nook  or  cranny  of  our  brain,  some  Master  Si- 
lence, or  Starveling  the  tailor,  or  Autolychus  the  rogue, 
whom  it  would  not  be  genteel  to  exhibit  to  our  Reason 
or  Conscience !  How  we  take  some  Dogberry,  or  Verges, 
or  Snug  the  joiner,  tattooed  and  carbanadoed  by  the 
world's  wit,  and  lay  him  on  the  soft  couch  of  our  esteem ! 
How  we  cuff  that  imp  of  mischief,  Mr.  Bailey,  as  though 
we  loved  him !  How  Peter  Peebles,  and  Baillie  Nicol 
Jarvie,  and  Dominie  Sampson,  and  old  Andrew  Fairser- 
vice,  push  themselves  into  our  imaginations,  and  imper- 
tinently abide  there,  whether  we  will  or  no  !  How 
Beatrice  and  Benedict  shoot  wit  at  us  from  their  eyes, 
as  the  sun  darts  beams  !  There  is  Touchstone,  "  swift 
and  sententious,"  bragging  that  he  has  "  undone  three 
tailors,  had  four  quarrels,  and  like  to  have  fought  one." 
There  is  Sancho  Panza,  with  his  shrewd  folly  and  selfish 
chivalry,  —  his  passion  for  food  an  argument  against  the 
dogma  of  the  soul's  residing  in  the  head, — a  pestilent  fine 
knave  and  unrighteous  good  fellow,  —  tossed  about  from 
generation  to  generation,  an  object  of  perpetual  merri- 
ment. "  That  man,"  said  King  Philip,  pointing  to  one 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  117 

of  his  courtiers,  rolling  on  the  floor  in  convulsions  of 
laughter,  —  "  that  man  must  either  be  mad,  or  reading 
Don  Quixote." 

But  what  shall  we  say  of  FalstafF? —  filling  up  the 
whole  sense  of  mirth,  —  his  fat  body  "larding  the  lean 
earth,"  as  he  walks  along,  —  coward,  bully,  thief,  glut- 
ton, all  fused  and  molten  in  good  humor,  —  his  talk  one 
incessant  storm  of  "  fiery  and  delectable  shapes"  from  his 
forgetive  brain  !  There,  too,  is  Mercutio,  the  perfection 
of  intellectual  spirits,  the  very  soul  of  gayety,  —  whose 
wit  seems  to  go  on  runners,  —  the  threads  of  his  brain 
light  as  gossamer  and  subtle  as  steel,  —  his  mirthful 
sallies  tingling  and  glancing  and  crinkling,  like  heat- 
lightning,  on  all  around  him !  How  his  flashing  badi- 
nage plays  with  Romeo's  love-forlornness !  "  Romeo  is 
dead  !  stabbed,  —  with  a  white  wench's  black  eye  ! 
Shot  through  the  ear  with  a  love-song !  The  very  pin 
of  his  heart  cleft  with  the  blind  bow-boy's  butt  shaft ! " 
Look,  too,  at  Thersites :  —  his  lithe  jests  piercing, 
sharper  than  Trojan  javelins,  the  brawny  Ajax  and 
Agamemnon,  and  his  hard  "  hits "  battering  their  thick 
skulls  worse  than  Trojan  battle-axes  ! 

If  ye  like  not  the  sardonic  Grecian,  then  cross  from 
Shakspeare  to  Scott,  and  shake  hands  with  that  bundle 
of  amiable  weaknesses,  Baillie  Nicol  Jarvie.  Who  can 
resist  the  cogent  logic  by  which  he  defends  his  free- 


118  WIT   AND   HUMOR. 

booter  kinsman,  Rob  Roy,  from  the  taunts  of  his  brother 
magistrates?  "I  tauld  them,"  said  he,  "that  I  would 
vindicate  nae  man's  faults  ;  but  set  apart  what  Rob  had 
done  again  the  law,  and  the  misfortune  o'  some  folk 
losing  life  by  him,  and  he  was  an  honester  man  than 
stude  on  any  o'  their  shanks  ! " 

Look  ye  now,  for  one  moment,  at  the  deep  and  deli- 
cate humor  of  Goldsmith.  How  at  his  touch  the  venial 
infirmities  and  simple  vanity  of  the  good  Vicar  of  Wake- 
field  live  lovingly  before  the  mind's  eye  !  How  we 
sympathize  with  poor  Moses  in  that  deep  trade  of  his 
for  the  green  spectacles  !  How  all  our  good  wishes  for 
aspiring  rusticity  thrill  for  the  showman,  who  would 
let  his  bear  dance  only  to  the  genteelest  tunes  !  There, 
too,  is  Fielding.  Who  can  forget  the  disputes  of  Square 
and  Thwackem ;  the  raging,  galvanized  imbecility  of  old 
Squire  Western ;  the  good,  simple  Parson  Adams,  who 
thought  schoolmasters  the  greatest  of  men,  and  himself 
the  greatest  of  schoolmasters  ! 

But  why  proceed  in  an  enumeration  of  characters 
whose  name  is  Legion  —  who  spring  up,  at  the  slightest 
call,  like  Rhoderick  Dhu's  men,  from  every  bush  and 
brake  of  memory,  and  come  thronging  and  crowding  into 
the  brain !  There  they  are,  nature's  own  capricious 
offspring — with  the  unfading  rose  in  their  puffed  cheeks, 
with  the  unfailing  glee  in  their  twinkling  eyes  : 


WIT   AND   HTJMOR.  119 

"  Age  cannot  wither,  nor  custom  stale 
Their  infinite  variety ! " 

If  "  time  and  the  hour"  would  admit,  it  would  not  be 
out  of  place  to  refer  to  Wit  as  an  auxiliary  power  in 
contests  of  the  intellect;  to  its  influence  in  detecting 
sophisms  which  elude  serious  reasoning,  such  as  the  sub- 
stitution, so  common  among  the  prejudiced  and  the  igno- 
rant, q£.4alse  causes  for  striking  effects.  In  Mirth,  too, 
are  often  expressed  thoughts  of  the  utmost  seriousness, 
feelings  of  the  greatest  depth.  Many  men  are  too  sensi- 
tive to  give  voice  to  their  most  profound  or  enthusiastic 
emotions,  except  through  the  language  of  caricature,  or 
the  grotesque  forms  of  drollery.  Tom  Hood  is  an  in- 
stance. We  often  meet  men  whose  jests  convey  truths 
plucked  from  the  bitterest  personal  experience,  and  whose 
very  laughter  tells  of  the  "  secret  wounds  which  bleed 
beneath  their  cloaks."  Whenever  you  find  Humor,  you 
find  Pathos  close  by  its  side. 

Every  student  of  English  theological  literature  knows 
that  much  of  its  best  portions  gleams  with  wit.  Five 
of  the  greatest  humorists  that  ever  made  the  world 
ring  with  laughter  were  priests,  —  Rabelais,  Scarron, 
Swift,  Sterne,  and  Sydney  Smith.  The  prose  works 
of  Milton  are  radiant  with  satire  of  the  sharpest  kind. 
Sydney  Smith,  one  of  the  most  benevolent,  intelligent 
and  influential  Englishmen  of  the  nineteenth  century, 


120  WIT   AND   HUMOR. 

a  man  of  the  most  accurate  insight  and  extensive 
information,  embodied  the  large  stores  of  his  practical 
wisdom  in  almost  every  form  of  the  ludicrous.  Many 
of  the  most  important  reforms  in  England  are  directly 
traceable  to  him.  He  really  laughed  his  countrymen  out 
of  some  of  their  most  cherished  stupidities  of  legislation. 
And  now  let  us  be  just  to  Mirth.  Let  us  be  thankful 
that  we  have  in  Wit  a  power  before  which  the  pride  of 
wealth  and  the  insolence  of  office  are  abased ;  which 
can  transfix  bigotry  and  tyranny  with  arrows  of  light- 
ning ;  which  can  strike  its  object  over  thousands  of  miles 
of  space,  across  thousands  of  years  of  time  ;  and  which, 
through  its  sway  over  an  universal  weakness  of  man,  is 
an  everlasting  instrument  to  make  the  bad  tremble  and 
the  foolish  wince.  Let  us  be  grateful  for  the  social  and 
humanizing  influences  of  Mirth.  Amid  the  sorrow,  dis- 
appointment, agony  and  anguish  of  the  world,  —  over 
dark  thoughts  and  tempestuous  passions,  the  gloomy  ex- 
aggerations of  self-will,  the  enfeebling  illusions  of  melan- 
choly, —  Wit  and  Humor,  light  and  lightning,  shed  their 
soft  radiance,  or  dart  their  electric  flash.  See  how  life 
is  warmed  and  illumined  by  Mirth  !  See  how  the  beings 
of  the  mind,  with  which  it  has  peopled  our  imaginations, 
wrestle  with  the  ills  of  existence,  —  feeling  their  way 
into  the  harshest  or  saddest  meditations,  with  looks  that 
defy  calamity ;  relaxing  muscles  made  rigid  with  pain ; 


WIT   AND   HUMOR.  121 

hovering  o'er  the  couch  of  sickness,  with  sunshine  and 
laughter  in  their  beneficent  faces  ;  softening  the  austerity 
of  thoughts  whose  awful  shadows  dim  and  darken  the 
brain,  —  loosening  the  gripe  of  Misery  as  it  tugs  at  the 
heart-strings  !  Let  us  court  the  society  of  these  game- 
some, and  genial,  and  sportive,  and  sparkling  beings, 
whom  Genius  has  left  to  us  as  a  priceless  bequest ;  push 
them  n/rtr-  from  the  daily  walks  of  the  world's  life  ;  let 
them  scatter  some  humanities  in  the  sullen  marts  of  busi- 
ness ;  let  them  glide  in  through  the  open  doors  of  the 
heart;  let  their  glee  lighten  up  the  feast,  and  gladden 
the  fireside  of  home  :  — 

"  That  the  night  may  be  filled  with  music, 

And  the  cares  that  infest  the  day 
May  fold  their  tents,  like  the  Arabs, 
And  as  silently  steal  away." 


THE  LUDICROUS   SIDE   OF   LIFE* 


IN  a  lecture  on  "Wit  and  Humor,  which  I  had  the  honor 
of  delivering  before  this  society  last  winter,  I  attempted 
an  analysis  of  those  qualities, — exhibited  the  influence  of 
Wit  as  a  political  weapon,  and  alluded  to  Humor  as  a 
creator  of  comic  character.  This  evening,  I  desire  to  ask 
your  attention  to  another  department  of  the  same  exhaust- 
less  subject, — The  Ludicrous  Side  of  Life  j  that  is,  those 
aspects  of  crime,  misery,  folly  and  weakness,  under  which 
they  appear  laughable  as  well  as  lamentable.  The  sub- 
ject is  so  philosophical  in  its  nature,  presents  so  many  of 
the  more  remote  and  elusive  points  of  character  for 
analysis,  and  demands  so  rigorous  a  classification  of  social 
facts,  that  the  audience  must  pardon  me  if  the  amuse- 
ment suggested  by  the  title  of  the  lecture  is  not  borne 
out  by  a  corresponding  pleasantry  in  its  treatment. 

The  ludicrous  in  life  arises  from  the  imperfection  of 

*  Delivered  before  the  Boston  Mercantile  Library  Association, 
October,  1346. 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF    LIFE.  123 

human  nature,  from  that  perpetual  contradiction  between 
our  acts  and  aspirations  which  makes  our  ideas  everlast- 
ing satires  on  our  deeds  and  institutions.  If  we  consider 
only  the  elements  of  human  nature,  we  can  ea?ily  con- 
ceive them  so  harmoniously  combined  as  to  constitute 
perfection  of  character ;  but  the  moment  we  pass  from 
thoughts  to  facts,  we  are  amazed  at  the  monstrous  per- 
versio*s"and  misdirections  of  these  elements.  Instead 
of  a  reciprocal  action  of  coordinate  powers,  we  find  what 
appears  to  be  a  mad  jumble  of  conflicting  opinions  and 
impulses.  We  see  the  seemingly  self-centred  being,  who 
goes  under  the  name  of  Man,  whirled  continually  from 
his  beckoning  ideals  by  a  thousand  seductive  external 
impressions ;  changing  from  "  half  dust,  half  deity,"  into 
all  dust  and  no  deity ;  and  running  the  dark  round  of 
weakness  and  wickedness,  from  the  besotted  stupidity  of 
the  idiot,  to  the  grinning  malignity  of  the  fiend.  We 
turn,  heart-sick  and  brain-sick,  to  the  past,  only  to  find  tht 
same  moral  chaos, — a  confused  mass  of  folly  and  crime, 
dignified  now  with  the  title  of  expediency,  now  with  that 
of  glory,  —  Caligulas  and  Neros,  Caesars  and  Napoleons, 
James  Stuarts  and  Frederick  Williams,  each  experiment- 
ing on  the  most  efficacious  way  of  ruining  nations,  each 
playing  off  a  gigantic  game  of  theft  or  murder  before  an 
admiring  or  reverential  world.  Vice  on  the  throne,  vir- 
tue on  the  gibbet, — there  you  have  the  two  prominent 


124  THE   LUDICROUS   SIDE   OF   LIFE. 

figures  in  the  grand  historical  picture  painted  on  the 
wide  canvass  of  time. 

Now,  unless  there  were  in  the  human  mind  certain 
powers,  by  which  all  this  wickedness  and  wretchedness 
could  be  gazed  at  from  a  different  point  of  view  than  that 
of  passion  or  conscience,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that 
thought  and  observation  would  drive  every  good  man 
into  insanity.  We  know  this  from  the  manner  in  which 
excitable  spirits  all  around  us  rave  and  fret  at  the  world's 
evil,  even  now.  We  may  not  say  how  thin  is  often  the 
partition  which  separates  the  caucus  and  reform  meeting 
from  the  strait-jacket  and  the  maniac's  cell;  and  in 
how  many  hearts,  on  fire  with  an  indignant  hatred  of 
oppression  and  hypocrisy,  there  burns  the  impatient 
impulse  of  the  blind  giant  of  old,  to  pull  down  the  pillars 
of 'the  social  edifice,  if  by  so  doing  they  might  crush  the 
Philistines  feasting  within  its  walls.  But  the  human 
mind  cannot  long  live  on  stilts,  and  nature  therefore  has 
provided  two  powers  by  which  the  asperities  of  sensibility 
may  be  softened, — Imagination  and  Mirth  :  Imagination 
cunningly  substituting  its  own  ideals  for  facts,  and 
smoothly  cheering  the  mind  with  beautiful  illusions; 
Mirth  looking  facts  right  in  the  face,  detecting  their  ludi- 
crous side,  and  turning  them  into  objects  of  genial  glee 
or  scornful  laughter.  By  a  perception  of  human  faults 
and  follies  under  the  conditions  of  Humor,  we  lose  our 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE.  125 

indignant  disgust,  and  regain  our  humanity;  and  by 
seeing  crime  with  the  eye  of  Wit,  we  find  that  it  is  as 
essentially  mean,  little  and  ridiculous,  as  it  is  hateful. 
The  serpent,  it  is  true,  still  retains  its  form ;  but  its  head 
is  no  longer  raised,  its  eyes  no  longer  glitter,  its  fangs  no 
longer  dart  poison,  but  it  crawls  fearfully  away  to  its  foul 
hiding-place,  the  trample  and  spurn  of  every  contemptu- 
ous heel — and  then  it  becomes  our  turn  to  hiss  !  What, 
indeed,  can  be  more  pitiably  ridiculous  than  the  spectacle 
of  a  man,  endowed  at  the  best  or  worst  with  but  a  small 
portion  of  a  demon's  venom  or  a  demon's  power,  setting 
himself  up  against  God  and  the  nature  of  things  !  —  an 
insignificant  insect  in  the  path  of  the  lightning,  sagely 
bullying  the  bolt ! 

Thus  the  crimes  and  infirmities  of  human  nature,  as 
manifested  in  the  million  diversities  of  character  a^d 
peculiarities  of  action  and  position,  can  be  made  the  sub 
jects  of  merriment  as  well  as  moralizing.  Change  the 
point  of  view,  and  the  things  which  made  us  shriek  will 
make  us  laugh.  From  Lucifer  to  Jerry  Sneak,  there  is 
not  an  aspect  of  evil,  imperfection  and  littleness,  which 
can  elude  the  light  of  Humor  or  the  lightning  of  Wit. 
It  would  be  impossible,  in  one  or  twenty  lectures,  to  show 
the  unnumbered  varieties  of  Mirth,  from  which  these 
crimes  and  infirmities  may  be  viewed.  I  shall  confine 
myself,  therefore,  to  the  two  extremes  of  Humor  and  Wit, 


126  THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE, 

the  jovial  and  the  bitter ;  and  I  cannot  better  illustrate 
them  than  by  a  consideration  of  the  two  great  exponents 
of  these  extremes,  Rabelais  and  Shakspeare's  Thersites. 
Between  these  lie  unnumbered  varieties  of  mirth.  Ra- 
belais is  all  fun  at  human  weakness ;  Thersites,  all  gall 
at  human  depravity.  And  first,  let  us  look  at  Rabelais, 
the  wisest,  shrewdest,  coarsest,  most  fertile,  most  reckless, 
of  all  humorists.  Both  his  life  and  works  were  steeped 
in  fun  to  the  very  lips.  Fun  seemed  the  condition  of  his 
being ;  his  genius,  learning,  passions,  hopes,  faith,  all  in- 
stinctively fashioned  themselves  into  some  of  the  various 
oddities  of  mirth.  Hermes  shook  hands  with  Momus  at 
his  nativity.  The  period  in  which  he  lived,  the  first  half 
of  the  sixteenth  century,  was  one  of  amazing  licentious- 
ness ;  and  he  has  portrayed  it  with  a  vulgarity  as  amazing. 
The  religion  of  that  age  seemed  to  consist  in  the  worship 
of  two  deities  from  the  heathen  heaven,  Mars  and  Bac- 
chus, and  two  devils  from  the  Christian  pandemonium, 
Moloch  and  Belial.  Its  enormities  were  calculated  to  pro- 
voke a  shudder  rather  than  a  smile.  Yet  to  Rabelais,  the 
dark  intrigues  of  poisoners  and  slabbers  calling  them- 
selves statesmen,  and  the  desolating  wars  waged  by 
sceptred  highwaymen  cfilling  themselves  kings,  appeared 
exquisitely  ridiculous.  All  the  actors  in  that  infernal 
farce,  all  who  led  up  the  giddy  death-dance  of  the  tyrants 
and  bacchanals,  only  drew  from  him  roar  upon  roar  of 


THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE.  127 

elephantine  laughter.  His  humor  rushes  from  him  like 
an  inundation,  unfixing  the  solidest  pyramids  of  human 
pride,  whelming  everything  away  in  a  flood  of  ridicule. 
All  that  was  externally  dignified  in  the  church  and  state 
of  Europe,  —  kings,  queens,  nobles,  cardinals,  —  he  tum- 
bles about  like  so  many  mischievous  children,  and  makes 
them  indulge  in  the  most  insane  freaks  of  elvish  caprice. 
But^4iere  we  must  distinguish  between  the  resistless 
mirth  of  Rabelais,  which  is  compatible  with  essential 
humanity,  and  the  monstrous  glee  of  some  base  and 
detestable  tyrants,  who  have  jested  with  human  blood, 
and  found  a  demoniacal  delight  in  laughing  over  deeds 
which  have  consigned  them  to  the  execration  of  posterity. 
Such  was  Nero,  who  saw  in  the  burning  of  Rome,  set  on 
fire  by  himself,  only  an  occasion  for  exercising  his  musi- 
cal talents.  Such  was  Barr£re,  that  miracle  of  cruelty 
and  baseness,  who,  amid  all  the  horrors  of  the  French 
Revolution,  never  descended  into  the  weakness  of  pity, 
but  performed  the  worst  atrocities  of  oppression  and  mur- 
der with  a  fiendish  glee.  Thus,  to  please  an  infamous 
companion,  he  obtained  the  passage  of  a  law  denouncing 
the  wearing  of  a  certain  head-dress  as  a  capital  crime 
against  the  state.  He  never  told  the  story,  says  his 
biographer,  without  going  into  convulsions  of  laughter, 
which  made  his  hearers  hope  he  would  choke;  and 
Macaulay  adds,  that  there  must  have  been  something 


128  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE. 

peculiarly  tickling  and  exhilarating,  to  a  mind  like  his, 
"  in  this  grotesque  combination  of  the  frivolous  and  the 
horrible,  —  false  hair  and  curling-irons  with  spouting 
arteries  and  reeking  hatchets."  Such  laughter  as  this 
might  indeed  make 

"  Hell's  burning  rafters 
Unwillingly  reecho  laughters." 

But  such  was  not  the  mirth  of  Rabelais.  He  could  not 
have  laughed  with  Nero  and  Barrere ;  he  could  not  have 
helped  laughing  at  them. 

From  the  stories  told  of  Rabelais,  he  must  have  been 
in  life  the  same  strange,  wise,  sharp,  and  mirthful  imp, 
which  he  appears  in  his  writings.  He  seems  even  to 
have  looked  death  in  the  face  with  a  grin  on  his  own. 
As  his  friends  were  weeping  round  his  bed,  he  exclaimed, 
— "  Ah  !  if  I  were  to  die  ten  times  over.  I  should  never 
make  you  cry  half  so  much  as  I  have  made  you  laugh." 
Being  pressed  by  some  ravenous  relations,  who  thought 
him  rich,  to  sign  a  will  leaving  them  large  legacies,  he 
at  last  complied,  and  on  being  asked  where  the  money 
could  be  found,  he  answered,  "  As  for  that,  you  must  do 
like  the  spaniel,  look  about  and  search."  As  he  was 
dying,  a  page  entered  from  the  Cardinal  du  Bellay,  to 
inquire  after  his  health.  The  old  humorist  muttered  in 
reply, — "  Tell  my  lord  in  what  circumstance  you  found 
me ;  I  am  just  going  to  leap  into  the  dark.  He  is  up  in 


THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE.  129 

the  cock-loft ;  bid  him  stay  where  he  is.  As  for  thee, 
thou  'It  always  be  a  fool.  Let  down  the  curtain ;  the 
farce  is  done."  Immediately  after  his  death,  his  relations 
seized  upon  a  sealed  paper,  purporting  to  be  his  last  will 
and  testament,  which,  on  being  opened,  was  found  to 
contain  three  pithy  articles  :  "I  owe  much ;  I  have  noth- 
ing :  I  leave  the  rest  to  the  poor." 

Many  eminent  and  some  virtuous  men  have  left  the 
world  with  jests  on  their  lips.  Augustus  Caesar  appealed 
to  the  friends  round  his  dying  bed,  if  he  had  not  very 
well  acted  the  farce  of  life.  Sir  Thomas  More  joked  on 
the  scaffold.  The  wit  of  Lord  Dorset,  in  his  last  hours, 
surprised  even  Congreve,  the  wittiest  of  English  comic 
dramatists.  But  Eabelais,  in  life  and  death,  was  the 
most  consistent  of  all  the  tribe  of  Democritus.  His 
deepest  and  subtlest  meditations,  his  most  earnest  loves 
and  hatreds,  were  sportively  expressed ;  and  when  he  came 
to  "  leap  into  the  dark,"  it  was  a  jest  that  lit  the  way. 
It  would  be  easy  to  moralize  out  the  rest  of  the  hour  on 
such  a  mirthful  monstrosity  as  this ;  but  that  is  not  my 
business  here.  There  the  old  wag  stands  in  literary  history 
—  a  monument  of  mirth,  with  his  large,  unctuous  brain, 
his  rosy  and  roguish  face,  his  fat  free-and-easiness  ;  a  mad 
jest  lurking  in  every  line  of  his  lawless  lips,  a  wild  glee 
leaping  in  every  glance  of  his  laughing  eyes !  There  is 

but  one  Rabelais. 

9 


130  THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE. 

Now  Thersites,  in  Shakspeare's  Trolius  and  Cres- 
sida,  is  a  man  of  an  entirely  different  make.  He  repre- 
sents the  class  of  wits  who  hate  and  deride  crime  from 
no  love  of  virtue,  and  belittle  greatness  merely  to  glut 
their  waspish  spleen.  But  he  is  perfect  in  his  way.  .  He 
talks  a  whole  armory  of  swords  and  stilettos.  His  words 
hurtle  through  the  air  like  fire-tipped  arrows.  They 
seem  almost  to  hit  the  reader,  —  so  keen  are  they,  and 
sent  with  such  unerring  aim.  He  is  the  thorniest  of  all 
wits.  His  bitter  brilliancy  bites  into  the  very  core  of 
things.  The  great-limbed  Homeric  heroes.  Achilles, 
Ajax,  Agamemnon,  look  small  enough  in  his  stabbing 
sentences.  His  railing  is  more  executive  than  their 
smiting  arms ;  and  he  tosses  them  up  and  down,  riddling 
them  with  his  satire,  almost  impaling  them  with  his 
edged  scorn.  "  Hector,"  he  says  to  Ajax  and  Achilles, 
"  Hector  will  have  a  great  catch  if  he  knocks  out  either 
of  your  brains  ;  'a  were  as  good  crack  a  fusty  nut  with 
no  kernel."  And  then  how  his  sharp  malice  exults  over 
these  examples  of  "  valiant  ignorance,"  these  "  sodden- 
witted  lords,  that  wear  their  tongues  in  their  arms ! " 
His  description  of  Ajax  ruminating  is  perfect.  "  He 
bites  his  lip  with  a  politic  regard,  as  who  should  say  — 
There  were  wit  in  this  head  an  't  would  out :  and  so  there 
is  ;  but  it  lies  as  coldly  in  him  as  fire  in  a  flint,  which 
will  not  show  without  knocking."  Again,  he  calls  him 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE.  131 

the  "  idol  of  idiot  worshippers,"  "  a  full  dish  of  fool,"  "  a 
mongrel  cur;"  and  the  richly  dressed  Patroclus  he 
addresses  as  —  "Thou  idle  immaterial  skein  of  sleive 
silk,  thou  green  sarcenet  flap  for  a  sore  eye,  thou  tassel 
of  a  prodigal's  purse,  thou  !  Ah !  how  the  poor  world  is 
pestered  with  such  water-flies,  diminutives  of  nature  !  " 
So  fates  it  with  "  that  same  dog-fox,  Ulysses,  and  that 
stale  old  mouse-eaten  dry  cheese,  Nes*>r."  Every  one 
who  wishes  to  know  the  height  and  depth  of  railing 
should  give  his  days  and  nights  to  Thersites.  He  accu- 
mulates round  the  objects  of  his  hatred  all  images  of 
scorn  and  contumely ;  and  he  hates  everybody,  not 
excluding  himself.  Everything  in  him  has  turned  to 
spleen ;  everything  that  comes  from  him  is  dipped  in  his 
gall.  His  criticism  of  the  persons  and  events  of  the 
Trojan  war,  as  they  pass  before  his  view,  takes  the  heroic 
element  clean  out  of  them.  It  is  wonderfully  edifying  to 
hear  him  discourse  of  Paris  and  Helen.  With  one  stroke 
of  his  tongue  heroes  descend  into  beef-witted  bullies, 
goddesses  dwindle  down  into  silly  girls.  He  buzzes  over 
the  Grecian  camp  like  a  hornet,  and  seizes  every  favora- 
ble moment  to  dart  down  and  sting.  No  matter  how 
much  he  is  beaten  by  the  brawny  fist  of  his  master  Ajax 
—  his  tongue  revenges  every  blow  in  a  hail-storm  of 
scurrilous  words.  You  can  hear  them  patter  on  the 
helmets  of  the  Greeks,  like  a  shower  of  Trojan  stones. 


132  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE. 

Thersites  is  an  everlasting  proof  of  the  resistless  power 
of  the  tongue.  He  lashes  both  armies  with  a  whip  of 
words,  and  leaves  his  jests  sticking  in  their  flesh  like  so 
many  thorns  and  thistles.  The  fine  audacity  of  Shaks- 
peare's  world-wide  genius  could  hardly  have  been  more 
splendidly  displayed  than  thus  in  placing  the  bitterest  of 
human  satirists  side  by  side  with  the  most  poetical  of 
human  heroes.  • 

In  looking  at  the  laughable  side  of  life,  it  might  be 
dangerous  to  depict  it  d  la  Rabelais  or  d  la  Thersites. 
But  between  these  extremes  are  numberless  varieties  ; 
and  it  is  from  some  half-way  station,  perhaps,  that  we 
may  obtain  the  best  view.  We  have  already  seen  that 
it  is  from  the  inharmoniousness  and  consequent  perver- 
sion of  the  human  mind  that  the  ludicrous  in  human 
life  has  its  source,  and  in  proportion  to  the  vividness 
with  which  we  perceive  the  original  laws  and  principles 
thus  perverted,  will  be  the  clearness  of  our  insight  into 
the  ridiculousness  of  the  perversions.  Now  everything 
morbid,  diseased  and  one-sided,  everything  out  of  its  due 
relations,  all  excess  in  the  development  of  any  one  faculty 
or  opinion,  go  to  make  up  the  vast  mass  of  life's  bombast 
and  bathos.  The  slightest  glance  at  society  reveals  the 
most  contemptible  shams  strutting  under  borrowed  names. 
Nothing  in  itself  good  but  is  transformed  by  the  cunning 
alchemy  of  selfishness  into  some  portentous  evil  or  pitiful 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE.  133 

deception,  transparent  to  the  eye  of  Mirth,  but  full  of 
sacredness  to  the  eye  of  Wonder.  There  is  a  great 
difference,  says  Coleridge,  "  between  an  egg  and  an  egg- 
shell; but  at  a  distance  they  look  remarkably  alike." 
Now,  to  question  these  deceptions,  to  pierce  these  bubbles 
with  shafts  that  disclose  their  emptiness,  generally  raises 
the  *rnost  discordant  cackling  among  the  world's  geese. 
Miss  Pigeon  is  so  charmed  with  the  attentions  of  Captain 
Rook,  that  she  grows  amazingly  indignant  at  the  voice 
which  forbids  the  banns.  Appearances  have  so  long  been 
confounded  with  realities,  that  an  attack  on  the  one  is  too 
commonly  taken  as  evidence  of  enmity  to  the  other;  and, 
like  the  charmed  bullet  of  the  hunter,  strikes  the  shepherd, 
though  directed  at  the  wolf.  Everybody  knows  that 
fanaticism  is  religion  caricatured ;  bears,  indeed,  about  the 
same  relation  to  it  that  a  monkey  bears  to  a  man ;  yet, 
with  many,  contempt  of  fanaticism  is  received  as  a  sure 
sign  of  hostility  to  religion.  Thus  things  go  moaning 
up  and  down  for  their  lost  words,  and  words  are  perpetu- 
ally engaged  in  dodging  things ;  and  it  becomes  exceed- 
ingly dangerous  for  a  prudent  man  to  discriminate 
between  a  truth  and  its  distortion  —  between  prudence 
and  avarice,  acuteness  and  cunning,  sentiment  and  sen- 
timentality, sanctity  and  sanctimoniousness,  justice  and 
"Revised  Statutes,"  the  dignity  of  human  nature  and 


134  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE. 

the  Hon.  Mr. ;  yet  it  is  just  in  this  discrimina- 
tion that  the  ludicrous  side  of  life  is  revealed. 

And  now  let  us  glance  at  this  heaving  sea  of  human 
life,  with  its  pride,  its  vanity,  its  hypocrisy,  its  selfishness, 
its  match-making,  its  scandal-mongering,  its  substitution 
of  the  plausible  for  the  true,  the  respectable  for  the  good, 
and  pick  out  a  few  of  its  leading  falsehoods  for  comment. 
The  first  quality  that  strikes  us  here  is  human  pride,  with 
its  long  trains  of  hypocrisy  and  selfishness.  "  This  comes 
of  walking  on  the  earth,"  said  the  Spanish  hidalgo  of 
Quevedo,  when  he  fell  upon  the  ground.  Alas!  that 
Tom  Moore's  bitter  pleasantry  on  the  peacock  politician 
should  apply  to  so  large  a  portion  of  mankind :  — 

"  The  best  speculation  that  the  market  holds  forth, 
To  any  enlightened  lover  of  pelf, 

Is  to  buy up  at  the  price  he  is  worth, 

And  sell  him  at  that  he  puts  on  himself." 

Now  this  pride,  this  self-exaggeration,  the  parent  of  all 
spiritual  sins,  tracing  its  long  lineage  up  to  Lucifer  him- 
self, is  as  ridiculous  as  it  is  malignant.  From  our  well- 
bred  horror  of  the  Satanic,  the  devil  to  us  is  a  sublimely 
wicked  object ;  but  I  can  conceive  of  Rabelais  as  rushing 
into  convulsions  of  laughter  at  the  folly  of  Satan,  —  at 
the  mere  idea  of  imperfect  evil  waging  its  weak  war 
against  omnipotent  Good ! 

What  a  lesson,  indeed,  is   all  history,  and  all  life, 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE.  135 

to  the  folly  and  fruitlessness  of  pride !  The  Egyp- 
tian kings  had  their  embalmed  bodies  preserved  in 
massive  pyramids,  to  obtain  an  earthly  immortality. 
In  the  seventeenth  century  they  were  sold  as  quack 
medicines,  and  now  they  are  burnt  for  fuel !  "  The 
Egyptian  mummies,  which  Cambyses  or  Time  hath 
spared,  avarice  now  consumeth.  Mummy  is  become 
merchandise.  Mizraim  cures  wounds,  and  Pharaoh  is 
sold  for  balsams."  Pride  and  vanity  have  raised  those 
iron  walls  of  separation  between  men,  that  division  of 
humanity  into  classes  and  ranks,  which  neither  benevo- 
lence nor  religion  can  leap.  The  artificial  distinctions 
of  society,  the  parents  of  numberless  fooleries  of  bigotry 
and  prejudice,  will  probably  afford  matter  of  everlasting 
moralizing  to  the  preacher,  and  everlasting  merriment  to 
the  wit.  "  I  considered  him,"  said  a  witness  in  Thur- 
tell's  trial,  "I  considered  him  a  very  respectable  man." 
"  What  do  you  mean  by  respectable  ?  "  —  "  Why,  he  kept 
a  gig ! "  Rank,  birth,  wealth,  saith  the  worldling,  thou 
shalt  have  no  other  gods  but  these.  Genius  and  virtue 
are  good  only  when  they  are  genteel.  The  brother  of 
Beethoven  was  of  this  creed.  He  signed  his  name,  to 

distinguish  himself  from  his  landless  brother,  " 

Von  Beethoven,  Land-owner."  The  immortal  composer 
retorted  by  signing  his,  "  Ludwig  Von  Beethoven,  Brain- 
owner."  We  often  hear  in  society  the  magical  death* 


136  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF   LIFE. 

warrant  pronounced  —  "  He  does  not  belong  to  our  class 
—  she  does  not  belong  to  our  set"  —  as  if  those  words 
cast  out  the  condemned  into  another  species,  —  as  if  the 
class  or  set  included  all  in  the  world  we  are  bound  to 
esteem,  all  whose  rights  we  are  bound  to  respect.  The 
huntsman,  in  Joseph  Andrews,  calls  off  his  hounds  from 
chasing  the  poor  parson,  because  they  would  be  injured 
by  following  vermin  !  The  ludicrous  bigotries,  the  stu- 
pendous stupidities,  which  this  isblation  from  the  race 
engenders,  are  often  perfectly  amazing  instances  of  human 
folly.  "  When  a  country  squire,"  says  Sydney  Smith, 
"  hears  of  an  ape,  his  first  impulse  is  to  give  it  nuts  and 
apples;  when  he  hears  of  a  dissenter,  his  immediate 
impulse  is  to  commit  it  to  the  county  jail,  to  shave  its 
head,  to  alter  its  customary  food,  and  to  have  it  privately 
whipped."  In  Christian  England  the  feeling  of  caste  is 
nearly  as  potent  as  in  heathen  India.  The  nobleman 
hardly  realizes  that  he  belongs  to  the  same  original  spe- 
cies, and  has  part  in  the  same  original  sin,  as  the  miner 
and  cotton-spinner;  —  though  nothing  would  seem  to  be 
more  evident  than  that 

"  Prom  yon  blue  heaven  above  us  bent, 
The  gardener  Adam  and  his  wife 
Smile  at  the  claims  of  long  descent." 

But  we  need  not  cross  the  Atlantic  to  discover  these 
division  lines  between  the  vulgar  little  and  the  vulgar 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE.  137 

great.  The  weakness  of  the  American  people  is  the 
absurd  importance  they  attach  to  gentility.  To  gain 
this,  they  sacrifice  health,  strength,  comfort,  and  often 
honor.  As  a  man  here,  however,  must  have  power  as 
well  as  caste,  his  life  oscillates  between  two  ambitions ; 
the  ambition  to  be  popular,  and  the  ambition  to  be  gen- 
teel. '"Tie  accordingly  puts  his  "  universal  brotherhood  " 
into  sermons,  his  patriotism  into  Fourth  of  July  orations, 
and  his  life  and  soul  into  "  our  set."  It  is  curious  to  see 
the  agency  of  this  gentility  in  formalizing  even  love  and 
hatred.  "  What  will  Mrs.  Grundy  say  ?  " — this  pertinent 
interrogation  has  sorcery  enough  to  robe  malice  in  smiles, 
and  freeze  affection  into  haughtiness.  As  there  can  be  no 
happiness  in  marriage  without  station  and  style,  the  old 
worship  of  Cupid,  the  god,  is  transferred  to  cupidity,  the 
demon  ;  the  test  question,  not  what  a  person  is,  but  what 
a  person  has ;  and  the  motive,  not  so  much  love  as  an 
establishment.  This  has  become  so  common  that  it  is  no 
longer  called  sin,  but  prudence.  The  fact  is  so  glaring 
that  it  has  even  found  its  way  into  the  weak  heads  of 
sentimental  novelists.  The  last  result  of  all  this  foolery 
is  that  kind  of  intellectual  death  going  under  the  name 
of  fashionable  life;  the  declaration  that  man  is  not  a 
mysterious  compound  of  body  and  soul,  but  of  coat  and 
pantaloons ;  and  the  final  triumph  of  dandy  nature  over 
human  nature.  "  Nature,"  says  the  coxcomb  in  Colman's 


138  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE. 

comedy,  to  the  blooming  country  girl,  "  Nature  is  very 
clever,  for  she  made  you ;  but  nature  never  could  have 
made  me ! " 

The  two  pillars  which  support  this  edifice  of  human 
pride  are  impudence  and  hypocrisy,  or  shameless  preten- 
sion and  canting  pretension.  "  Words,"  said  a  cunning 
old  politician,  a  few  days  before  his  withdrawal  from  the 
palace  to  the  tomb,  "  words  were  given  to  conceal,  not  to 
express,  thought."  Of  how  large  a  portion  of  mankind 
may  it  be  said,  that  they  do  not  so  much  live  as  pretend  ? 
Raise  the  cry  of  any  reform,  and  crowds  of  sharpers  and 
dunces  rush  to  pick  pockets  and  talk  nonsense  under  its 
broad  banners,  and  the  satirist  stands  by  to  declare,  with 
South,  how  much  of  this  liberty  of  conscience  means 
liberty  from  conscience,  or,  with  Colton,  how  much  of  this 
freedom  of  thought  means  freedom  from  thought.  Con- 
servatism is  a  very  good  thing ;  but  how  many  conserva- 
tives announce  principles  which  might  have  shocked 
Dick  Turpin,  or  nonsensicalities  flat  enough  to  have 
raised  contempt  in  Jerry  Sneak !  "  A  conservative,"  says 
Douglas  Jerrold,  "  is  a  man  who  will  not  look  at  the  new 
moon,  out  of  respect  for  that '  ancient  institution,'  the  old 
one."  Radicalism  or  reform  is  another  very  good  thing ; 
but,  quaintly  says  old  Doctor  Fuller,  "  many  hope  that 
the  tree  will  be  felled,  who  hope  to  gather  chips  by  the 
fall."  When  Johnson  asserted  patriotism  to  be  the  last 


THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF   LIFE.  139 

refuge  of  the  scoundrel,  he  said  something  not  more  than 
half  true.  Would  we  could  aver  that  he  said  something 
more  than  half  wrong.  Philanthropy  is  another  very 
good  thing,  perhaps  the  best  of  all  good  things  ;  but  much 
of  it  which  we  see  is  of  a  cheap  kind ;  a  compounding  of 
"  sins  we  are  inclined  to,"  by  condemning  those  "  we 
nave^Be  mind  to;"  an  elegant  recreation  of  conscience, 
calling  for  no  self-sacrifice,  and  admitting  the  union  of 
noble  sentiments  with  ignoble  acts.  The  English  mer- 
chant professes  to  be  horror-struck  at  the  atrocities  of 
southern  slavery ;  the  slaveholder  curses  England  for  her 
starvation  policy  to  labor;  the  Yankee  is  liberal  of 
rebukes  to  both.  Now  this  inexpensive  moral  indignation 
may  produce  good  results ;  but  shall  we  throw  up  our 
caps  in  admiration  of  the  philanthropy  of  either  ?  No  ! 
for  on  the  broad  and  beautiful  brow  of  true  philanthropy 
is  written  self-denial,  self-sacrifice.  It  says,  the  system 
which  enriches  me  harms  another,  and  therefore  I  repu- 
diate it,  therefore  I  will  do  all  in  my  power  to  put  it 
down. 

This  conscious  hypocrisy  it  is  very  easy  to  understand ; 
but  there  is,  in  a  large  number  of  minds,  an  unconscious 
hypocrisy,  which  presents  an  almost  insoluble  problem  to 
the  investigator.  In  some  cases  it  is  self-deceit,  resulting 
from  weakness  or  ignorance.  In  others,  it  indicates  the 
passage  of  the  hypocrite  from  being  false  into  falsehood 


140  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LITE. 

itself;  the  quack  believing  in  his  own  impostures,  —  the 
hypocrisy,  once  on  the  surface,  eating  into  the  very  soul 
of  the  man,  and  lying  him  at  last  into  an  organic  lie. 
These  two  aspects  of  character  can  be  perceived,  but  not 
analyzed.  They  baffle  the  metaphysician,  only  to  shine 
more  resplendently  on  the  page  of  the  humorist.  What 
a  Leibnitz  or  Butler  could  but  imperfectly  convey,  looks 
out  upon  us  in  living  forms  from  the  picture-gallery  of 
Cervantes  and  Shakspeare,  of  Addison  and  Steele,  of 
Goldsmith  and  Dickens.  Without  recurring  to  these, 
instances  can  be  readily  adduced  from  every-day  life. 
Benevolence  and  malignity  often  coexist  in  retailers  of 
scandal ;  persons,  who  can  be  fitly  described  only  in  the 
verbal  paradoxes  launched  by  Timon  at  his  "  smiling, 
smooth,  detested"  parasites,  —  "courteous  destroyers, 
affable  wolves,  meek  bears."  Tears  are  copiously  show- 
ered over  frailties  the  discoverer  takes  a  malicious  delight 
in  circulating ;  and  thus,  all  granite  on  one  side  of  the 
heart,  and  all  milk  on  the  other,  the  unsexed  scandal- 
monger hies  from  house  to  house,  pouring  balm  from  its 
weeping  eyes  on  the  wounds  it  inflicts  with  its  Stabbing 
tongue.  Again,  —  you  all  know,  that,  a  short  time 
since,  when  a  fear  was  expressed  that  the  Bible  would  be 
banished  from  the  public  schools,  how  much  horror  and 
indignation  thereat  emitted  itself  in  the  lustiest  profane 
swearing.  But  perhaps  the  finest  instance  of  this  uncon- 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF    LIFE.  141 

scious  hypocrisy  is  the  fact  related  of  the  simple  southern 
clergyman.  He  owned  half  of  a  negro  slave ;  and  in  his 
prayers,  therefore,  he  prayed  that  the  Lord  would  preserve 
his  house,  his  land,  his  family,  and  his  half  of  Pomp. 

It  would  be  impossible  to  note  a  thousandth  part  of  the 
hypocrisies,  conscious  or  unconscious,  woven  into  the 
very  fexture  of  every-day  life,  and  having  their  source  in 
the  desire  of  men  to  appear  better  than  they  are.  Popu- 
lar as  are  the  realities  of  avarice,  malice,  falsehood  and 
chicane,  nothing  is  more  unpopular  than  their  appear- 
ances. License,  therefore,  must  talk  the  language  of 
freedom ;  knavery  must  stalk  on  the  stilts  of  philan- 
thropy; public  plunder  and  national  degradation  must 
wear  the  guise  of  glory  and  patriotism.  Some  have 
almost  reached  the  perfection  of  South's  ideal  hypocrite, 
"who  never  opens  his  mouth  in  earnest,  but  when  he 
eats  or  breathes."  Everywhere,  cant ;  nowhere,  a  plain 
avowal  of  folly  or  selfishness.  Oliver  Cromwell  cannot 
butcher  a  couple  of  poor  Irish  garrisons,  without  doing  it 

for  the  glory  of  God ;  the  Hon.  Mr. cannot  argue 

in  favor  of  perpetual  slavery,  without  doing  it  for  the 
good  of  the  slave.  O  !  never  talk  of  rewarding  virtue, 
for  virtue  never  can  be  paid  in  the  world's  sugar-plums ; 
but  if  life  cannot  be  carried  on  without  roguery,  would  it 
not  be  well  to  place  a  bounty  on  courageous,  uncanting 
rascality,  and,  passing  by  a  heap  of  tongue-virtuous 


142  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE. 

hypocrites,   select  that    man   for  office   who   dares  to 
acknowledge  himself  a  rogue ! 

Among  the  countless  deceptions  passed  off  on  our 
sham-ridden  race,  let  me  direct  your  attention  to  the 
deception  of  dignity,  as  it  is  one  which  includes  many 
others.  Among  those  terms  which  have  long  ceased  to 
have  any  vital  meaning,  the  word  dignity  deserves  a  dis- 
graceful prominence.  No  word  has  fallen  so  readily  as 
this  into  the  designs  of  cant,  imposture  and  pretence ; 
none  has  played  so  well  the  part  of  verbal  scarecrow,  to 
frighten  children  of  all  ages  and  both  sexes.  It  is  at 
once  the  thinnest  and  most  effective  of  all  the  coverings 
under  which  duncedom  sneaks  and  skulks.  Most  of  the 
men  of  dignity,  who  awe  or  bore  their  more  genial 
brethren,  are  simply  men  possessing  the  art  of  passing 
off  their  insensibility  for  wisdom,  their  dulness  for  depth ; 
and  of  concealing  imbecility  of  intellect  under  haughti- 
ness of  manner.  Their  success  in  this  small  game  is  one 
of  the  stereotyped  satires  on  mankind.  Once  strip  from 
these  pretenders  their  stolen  garments,  once  disconnect 
their  show  of  dignity  from  their  real  meanness,  and  they 
would  stand  shivering  and  defenceless,  objects  of  the  tears 
of  pity,  or  targets  for  the  arrows  of  scorn.  But  it  is  the 
misfortune  of  this  world's  affairs,  that  offices,  fitly  occu- 
pied only  by  talent  and  genius,  which  despise  pretence, 
should  be  filled  by  respectable  stupidity  and  dignified 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF    LIFE.  143 

emptiness,  to  whom  pretence  is  the  very  soul  of  life. 
Manner  triumphs  over  matter ;  and  throughout  society, 
politics,  letters  and  science,  we  are  doomed  to  meet  a 
swarm  of  dunces  and  windbags,  disguised  as  gentlemen, 
statesmen  and  scholars.  Coleridge  once  saw,  at  a  dinner 
table,  a  dignified  man  with  a  face  wise  as  the  moon's. 
The  jnvful  charm  of  his  manner  was  not  broken  until 
the  muffins  appeared,  and  then  the  imp  of  gluttony  forced 
from  him  the  exclamation, — "Them's  the  jockeys  for 
me ! "  A  good  number  of  such  dignitarians  remain 
undiscovered. 

It  is  curious  to  note  how  these  pompous  gentlemen 
rule  in  society  and  government.  How  often  do  history 
and  the  newspapers  exhibit  to  us  the  spectacle  of  a 
heavy-headed  stupiditarian  in  official  station,  veiling  the 
sheerest  incompetency  in  a  mysterious  sublimity  of  car- 
riage, solemnly  trifling  away  the  interests  of  the  state, 
the  dupe  of  his  own  obstinate  ignorance,  and  engaged, 
year  after  year,  in  ruining  a  people  after  the  most  digni- 
fied fashion  !  You  have  all  seen  that  inscrutable  dispen- 
sation known  by  the  name  of  the  dignified  gentleman  : 
an  embodied  tediousness,  which  society  is  apt  not  only 
to  tolerate  but  worship ;  a  person  who  announces  the 
stale  commonplaces  of  conversation  with  the  awful  pre- 
cision of  one  bringing  down  to  the  valleys  of  thought 
bright  truths  plucked  on  its  summits;  who  is  so  pro- 


144  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE. 

foundly  deep  and  painfully  solid  on  the  weather,  the  last 
novel,  or  some  other  nothing  of  the  day ;  who  is  inex- 
pressibly shocked  if  your  eternal  gratitude  does  not  repay 
him  for  the  trite  information  he  consumed  your  hour  in 
imparting ;  and  who,  if  you  insinuate  that  his  calm,  con- 
tented, imperturbable  stupidity  is  preying  upon  your 
patience,  instantly  stands  upon  his  dignity,  and  puts  on  a 
face.  Yet  this  man,  with  just  enough  knowledge  "  to 
raise  himself  from  the  insignificance  of  a  dunce  to  the 
dignity  of  a  bore,"  is  still  in  high  favor  even  with  those 
whose  animation  he  checks  and  chills,  —  why?  Because 
he  has,  all  say,  so  much  of  the  dignity  of  a  gentleman ! 
The  poor,  bright,  good-natured  man,  who  has  done  all  in 
his  power  to  be  agreeable,  joins  in  the  cry  of  praise,  and 
feelingly  regrets  that  nature  has  not  adorned  him,  too, 
with  dulness  as  a  robe,  so  that  he  likewise  might  freeze 
the  volatile  into  respect,  and  be  held  up  as  a  model  spoon 
for  all  dunces  to  imitate.  This  dignity,  which  so  many 
view  with  reverential  despair,  must  have  twinned,  "  two 
at  a  birth,"  with  that  ursine  vanity  mentioned  by  Cole- 
ridge, "  which  keeps  itself  alive  by  sucking  the  paws  of 
its  own  self-importance."  The  Duke  of  Somerset  was 
one  of  these  dignified  gentlemen.  His  second  wife  was 
the  most  beautiful  woman  in  England.  She  once  sud- 
denly threw  her  arms  round  his  neck,  and  gave  him  a 
kiss  which  might  have  gladdened  the  heart  of  an  empe- 


THE    LUL1CROTJS   SIDE    OF    LIFE.  145 

tor.  The  duke,  lifting  his  heavy  head  awfully  up,  and 
giving  his  shoulders  an  aristocratic  square,  «lowly  said, 
"  Madam,  my  first  wife  was  a  Howard,  and  she  never 
would  have  taken  such  a  liberty." 

This  absurd  importance  attached  to  dignity  is  a  fertile 
source  of  bombast  in  life.  It  not  only  exalts  the  bad  or 
brainiest  into  high  position,  but  it  is  apt  to  convert  emi- 
nent men  into  embodied  hyperboles ;  for,  to  fulfil  the 
popular  requisitions  of  greatness,  you  will  sometimes  see 
statesmen  descend  into  this  poor  deception,  and,  though 
giants  in  action  or  speculation,  condescend  to  become 
charlatans  in  manner.  Lord  Chatham  and  Napoleon 
were  as  much  actors  as  Garrick  or  Talma.  Now,  an 
imposing  air  should  always  be  taken  as  evidence  of 
imposition.  Dignity  is  often  a  veil  between  us  and  the 
real  truth  of  things.  Wit  pierces  this  veil  with  its  glit- 
tering shafts,  and  lets  in  the  "  insolent  light."  Humor 
carelessly  lifts  the  curtain,  swaggers  jauntily  into  the 
place  itself,  salutes  the  amazed  wire-pullers  with  a  know- 
ing nod,  and  ends  with  slapping  Dignity  on  the  back, 
with  a  "  How  are  ye,  my  old  boy  ?" 

In  truth,  the  factitious  elevation  we  give  to  some  per- 
sons comes  from  identifying  the  actual  and  the  idea!, 
—  the  imagination  cunningly  suppressing  minor  faults, 
exaggerating  certain  qualities  into  colossal  size,  and  call- 
ing those  qualities  by  the  name  of  men.  The  characters 
10 


146  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE. 

of  distinguished  personages  are  generally  drawn  in  this 
way.  It  is  the  vice  of  most  biographies,  and  gires  a 
wooden  and  unnatural  aspect  to  most  characters  in  his- 
tory. The  difference  between  the  truth  and  deception,  in 
this  regard,  is  the  difference  between  a  character  drawn 
by  Kacine  and  a  character  drawn  by  Shakspeare  or 
Scott.  This  factitious  dignity  cannot  stand  a  moment 
the  test  of  ridicule.  One  of  the  most  externally  awful 
and  imposing  persons  in  the  world  is  the  Speaker  of  the 
House  of  Commons.  There  once  happened  to  be  a  dead 
silence  in  the  house,  when  its  members  were  all  present. 
This  was  broken  by  a  startling  hiccough  in  the  gal- 
lery, and  the  voice  of  a  drunken  reporter  putting  the 
stunning  interrogative,  "  Mr.  Speaker,  will  you  favor  us 
with  a  song  ?  " 

The  dainty  portions  of  literature  are  ever  liable  to 
overturn  from  the  shocks  of  prose.  Not  only  has  life  its 
ludicrous  side,  but  its  serious  side  has  its  ludicrous 
point.  Poetry  itself  is  often  an  exquisitely  ironical 
comment  upon  actual  life,  but  few  seem  to  take  the  joke. 
The  original  of  Goethe's  Werther,  whose  "  sorrows " 
have  become  immortal,  was  a  dull  fellow,  with  nothing 
in  his  face  indicative  of  sentiment  or  intelligence.  A 
person  who  visited  him  remarked,  that  nobody  would 
know  he  had  any  brains,  if  the  poet  had  not  informed  us 
he  had  blown  them  out.  Halleck's  notion  of  Wyoming, 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE.  147 

drawn  from  observation,  is  different  from  Campbell's, 
drawn  from  fancy.  The  Gertrude  of  Halleck  is  found 
"hoeing  corn."  Pastoral  life  can  hardly  be  found  in 
pastures.  All  heroism,  even,  which  depends  on  external 
costume  or  form,  is  ever  in  danger  of  being  killed  by 
little  actualities.  "The  Iliad,"  says  Sydney  Smith, 
"  would  never  have  come  down  to  these  times  if  Aga- 
memnon had  given  Achilles  a  box  on  the  ear.  We  should 
have  trembled  for  the  jEneid  if  some  Trojan  nobleman 
had  kicked  the  pious  JEneas  in  the  Fourth  Book.  ./Eneas 
may  have  deserved  it ;  but  he  could  not  have  founded 
the  Roman  empire  after  so  distressing  an  accident." 
And  we  have  all  seen  how  an  American  general,  singed 
and  scarred  with  the  fire  of  desperately  contested  battles, 
came  near  being  extinguished  at  last,  from  a  slightly 
increased  alacrity  in  the  disposition  of  his  soup. 

From  this  confounding  of  substance  with  form,  this 
universal  tendency  to  individual  exaggeration  and  bom- 
bast, this  stilted  way  of  carrying  on  life,  it  has  become 
customary  to  identify  mirth  with  frivolity.  Without 
insisting  upon  the  depth  and  wisdom  of  the  great  Wits 
and  Humorists  of  the  world,  it  is  evident  that  the  best 
arguments  are  often  condensed  into  epigrams,  and  that 
good  jokes  are  often  comprehensive  axioms. 

The  narrowness  of  utilitarianism  was  never  made  so 
evident  as  in  the  remark,  that  "  we  do  not  estimate  the 


148  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE. 

value  of  the  sun  by  the  amount  it  saves  us  in  gas." 
Carivle's  whole  theory  of  government  is  contained  in  a 
quibble,  —  that  nations  are  not  governed  by  the  able 
man,  but  the  man  able  to  get  appointed.  Superstitions, 
exploded  by  knowledge,  often  exist  as  puns.  Thus  some 
of  the  ancients,  who  believed  the  soul  to  be  made  of  fire, 
considered  death  by  drowning  to  be  remediless  —  water 
putting  the  soul  out.  An  epigram  often  flashes  light 
into  regions  where  reason  shines  but  dimly.  Holmes 
disposed  of  the  bigot  at  once,  when  he  compared  his 
mind  to  the  pupil  of  the  eye,  —  "the  more  light  you  let 
into  it,  the  more  it  contracts."  Nothing  better  exhibits 
the  horrors  of  capricious  despotism  than  the  humorous 
statement  of  the  King  of  Candia's  habits  :  "  If  his  tea  is 
not  sweet  enough,  he  impales  his  footman ;  and  smites 
off  the  head  of  half  a  dozen  noblemen,  if  he  has  a  pain 
in  his  own."  In  this  connection,  also,  it  is  not  inappro- 
priate to  refer  to  the  importance  of  a  vivid  perception  of 
the  ludicrous  as  a  weapon  of  self-defence.  That  habit 
of  instantaneous  analysis  which  we  call  readiness  has 
saved  thousands  from  contempt  or  mortification.  The 
dexterous  leap  of  thought,  by  which  the  mind  escapes 
from  a  seemingly  hopeless  dilemma,  is  worth  all  the 
vestments  of  dignity  which  the  world  holds.  It  was 
this  readiness  in  repartee  which  continually  saved  Vol- 
taire from  social  overturn.  He  once  praised  another 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE.  149 

writer  very  heartily  to  a  third  person.  "It  is  very 
strange,"  was  the  reply,  "  that  you  speak  so  well  of  him, 
for  he  says  that  you  are  a  charlatan."  —  "0!"  replied 
Voltaire,  "  I  think  it  very  likely  that  both  of  us  may  be 
mistaken."  Again,  you  must  all  have  heard  the  anecdote 
of  the  young  gentleman  who  was  discoursing  very  dog- 
matically about  the  appropriate  sphere  of  woman.  "And 

^  ( 

pray,  sir,"  screamed  out  an  old  lady,  "  what  is  the  appro- 
priate sphere  of  woman  ? "  —  "A  celestial  sphere,  mad- 
am ! "  Robert  Hall  did  not  lose  his  power  of  retort  even 
in  madness.  A  hypocritical  condoler  with  his  misfor- 
tunes once  visited  him  in  the  mad-house,  and  said,  in  a 
whining  tone,  "What  brought  you  here,  Mr.  Hall?" 
Hall  significantly  touched  his  brow  with  his  finger, 
and  replied,  "What '11  never  bring  you,  sir — too  much 
brain  ! "  A  rapid  change  from  enthusiasm  to  nonchalance 
is  often  necessary  in  society.  Thus  a  person  once  elo- 
quently eulogizing  the  angelic  qualities  of  Joan  of  Arc, 
was  suddenly  met  by  the  petulant  question,  —  what  was 
Joan  of  Arc  made  of  ?  "  She  was  Maid  of  Orleans." 
A  Yankee  is  never  upset  by  the  astonishing.  He  walks 
among  the  Alps  with  his  hands  in  his  pockets,  and  the 
smoke  of  his  cigar  is  seen  among  the  mists  of  Niagara. 
One  of  this  class  sauntered  into  the  office  of  the  light- 
ning telegraph,  and  asked  how  long  it  would  take  to 
transmit  a  message  to  Washington.  "  Ten  minutes," 


-    150  THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE. 

was  the  reply.  "  I  can't  wait,"  was  his  rejoinder.  Sher- 
idan never  was  without  a  reason,  never  failed  to  extricate 
himself  in  any  emergency  by  his  wit.  At  a  country 
house,  where  he  was  once  on  a  visit,  an  elderly  maiden 
lady  desired  to  be  his  companion  in  a  walk.  He  excused 
himself  at  first  on  the  ground  of  the  badness  of  the 
weather.  She  soon  afterwards,  however,  intercepted 
him  in  an  attempt  to  escape  without  her.  "  Well,"  she 
said,  "  it  has  cleared  up,  I  see."  —  "  Why  yes,"  he  an- 
swered, "  it  has  cleared  up  enough  for  one,  but  not  enough 
for  two."  It  was  this  readiness  which  made  John  Ran- 
dolph so  terrible  in  retort.  He  was  the  Thersites  of 
Congress,  —  a  tongue-stabber.  No  hyperbole  of  con- 
tempt or  scorn  could  be  launched  against  him,  but  he 
could  overtop  it  with  something  more  scornful  and  con- 
temptuous. Opposition  only  maddened  him  into  more 
brilliant  bitterness.  "  Is  n't  it  a  shame,  Mr.  President," 
said  he  one  day  in  the  senate,  "  that  the  noble  bull-dogs 
of  the  administration  should  be  wasting  their  precious 
time  in  worrying  the  rats  of  the  opposition."  Immedi- 
ately the  senate  was  in  an  uproar,  and  he  was  clamor- 
ously called  to  order.  The  presiding  officer,  however, 
sustained  him ;  and,  pointing  his  long,  skinny  finger  at 
his  opponents,  Randolph  screamed  out,  "Rats,  did  I 
say  ?  —  mice,  mice  !  " 

The  ludicrous  side  of  life,  like  the  serious  side,  has  its 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF    LIFE.  151 

literature,  and  it  is  a  literature  of  untold  wealth.  Mirth 
is  a  Proteus,  changing  its  shape  and  manner  with  the 
thousand  diversities  of  individual  character,  from  the 
most  superficial  gayety  to  the  deepest,  most  earnest 
humor.  Thus  the  wit  of  the  airy,  feather-brained  Far- 
quhar  glances  and  gleams  like  heat  lightning ;  that  of 
Miltoa  blasts  and  burns  like  the  bolt.  Let  us  glance 
carelessly  over  this  wide  field  of  comic  writers,  who  have 
drawn  new  forms  of  mirthful  being  from  life's  ludicrous 
side,  and  note,  here  and  there,  a  wit  or  humorist.  There 
is  the  humor  of  Goethe,  like  his  own  summer  morning, 
mirthfully  clear ;  and  there  is  the  tough  and  knotty 
humor  of  old  Ben  Jonson,  at  times  ground  down  at  the 
edge  to  a  sharp  cutting  scorn,  and  occasionally  hissing 
out  stinging  words,  which  seem,  like  his  own  Mercury's, 
"  steeped  in  the  very  brine  of  conceit,  and  sparkle  like 
salt  in  fire."  There  is  the  incessant  brilliancy  of  Sheri- 
dan,— 

"  Whose  humor,  as  gay  as  the  fire-fly's  light, 

Played  round  every  subject,  and  shone  as  it  played ; 
Whose  wit,  in  the  combat  as  gentle  as  bright, 
Ne'e'r  carried  a  heart-stain  away  on  its  blade." 

There  is  the  uncouth  mirth,  that  winds,  stutters,  wrig- 
gles and  screams,  dark,  scornful  and  savage,  amon^  the 
dislocated  joints  of  Carlyle's  spavined  sentences.  Thf5re 
is  the  lithe,  springy  sarcasm,  the  hilarious  badinage,  the 


152  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE. 

brilliant  careless  disdain,  which  sparkle  and  scorch  along 
the  glistening  page  of  Holmes.  There  is  the  sleepy  smile 
that  sometimes  lies  so  benignly  on  the  sweet  and  serious 
diction  of  old  Izaak  Walton.  There  is  the  mirth  of 
Dickens,  twinkling  now  in  some  ironical  insinuation,  — 
and  anon  winking  at  you  with  pleasant  maliciousness,  its 
distended  cheeks  fat  with  suppressed  glee,  —  and  then, 
again,  coming  out  in  broad  gushes  of  humor,  overflowing 
all  banks  and  bounds  of  conventional  decorum.  There 
is  Sydney  Smith,  —  sly,  sleek,  swift,  subtle,  —  a  mo- 
ment's motion,  and  the  human  mouse  is  in  his  paw ! 
Mark,  in  contrast  with  him,  the  beautiful  heedlessness 
with  which  the  Ariel-like  spirit  of  Gay  pours  itself  out 
in  benevolent  mockeries  of  human  folly.  There,  in  a 
corner,  look  at  that  petulant  little  man,  his  features 
working  with  thought  and  pain,  his  lips  wrinkled  with  a 
sardonic  smile  ;  and,  see  !  the  immortal  personality  has 
received  its  last  point  and  polish  in  that  toiling  brain, 
and,  in  a  straight,  luminous  line,  with  a  twang  like 
Scorn's  own  arrow,  hisses  through  the  air  the  unerring 
shaft  of  Pope,  —  to 

"  Dash  the  proud  gamester  from  his  gilded  car," 
And, 

"  Bare  the  base  heart  that  lurks  beneath  a  star." 

There,  a  little  above  Pope,  see  Dryden,  keenly  dissecting 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE    OF   LIFE.  153 

the  inconsistencies  of  Buckingham's  volatile  mind,  or 
leisurely  crushing  out  the  insect  life  of  Shad  well, — 

"  Owned,  without  dispute, 
Throughout  the  realms  of  Nonsense  absolute." 

There,  moving  gracefully  through  that  carpeted  parlor, 
mark  that  dapper,  diminutive  Irish  gentleman.  The 
momejit  you  look  at  him,  your  eyes  are  dazzled  with  the 
whizzing  rockets  and  hissing  wheels,  streaking  the  air 
with  a  million  sparks,  from  the  pyrotechnic  hrain  of 
Anacreon  Moore.  Again,  cast  your  eyes  from  that  blind- 
ing glare  and  glitter,  to  the  soft  and  beautiful  brilliancy, 
the  winning  grace,  the  bland  banter,  the  gliding  wit,  the 
diffusive  humor,  which  make  you  in  love  with  all  man- 
kind in  the  charming  pages  of  Washington  Irving.  And 
now,  for  another  change,  —  glance  at  the  jerks  and  jets 
of  satire,  the  mirthful  audacities,  the  fretting  and  teasing 
mockeries,  of  that  fat,  sharp  imp,  half  Mephistopheles, 
half  FalstafF,  that  cross  between  Beelzebub  and  Rabelais, 
known,  in  all  lands,  as  the  matchless  Mr.  Punch.  No 
English  statesman,  however  great  his  power,  no  English 
nobleman,  however  high  his  rank,  but  knows  tnat  every 
week  he  may  be  pointed  at  by  the  scoffing  finger  of  that 
omnipotent  buffoon,  and  consigned  to  the  ridicule  of  the 
world.  The  pride  of  intellect,  the  pride  of  wealth,  the 
power  to  oppress  —  nothing  can  save  the  dunce  or  crim- 
inal from  being  pounced  upon  by  Punch,  and  held  up  to 


154  THE    LUDICROUS    SIDE    OF    LIFE. 

a  derision  or  execration,  which  shall  ring  from  London  to 
St.  Petersburg,  from  the  Ganges  to  the  Oregon.  From 
the  vitriol  pleasantries  of  this  arch-fiend  of  Momus,  let 
us  turn  to  the  benevolent  mirth  of  Addison  and  Steele, 
whose  glory  it  was  to  redeem  polite  literature  from  moral 
depravity,  by  showing  that  wit  could  chime  merrily  in 
with  the  voice  of  virtue,  and  who  smoothly  laughed  away 
many  a  vice  of  the  national  character,  by  that  humor 
which  tenderly  touches  the  sensitive  point  with  an  evan- 
escent grace  and  genial  glee.  And  here  let  us  not  forget 
Goldsmith,  whose  delicious  mirth  is  of  that  rare  quality 
which  lies  too  deep  for  laughter,  —  which  melts  softly 

into  the  mind,  suffusing  it  with  inexpressible  delight,  and 
• 
sending  the  soul  dancing  joyously  into  the  eyes,  to  utter 

its  merriment  in  liquid  glances,  passing  all  the  expression 
of  tone.  And  here,  though  we  cannot  do  him  justice, 
let  us  remember  the  name  of  Nathaniel  Hawthorne, 
deserving  a  place  second  to  none  in  that  band  of  humor- 
ists whose  beautiful  depth  of  cheerful  feeling  is  the  very 
poetry  of  mirth.  In  ease,  grace,  delicate  sharpness  of 
satire,  —  in  a  felicity  of  touch  which  often  surpasses  the 
felicity  of  Addison,  in  a  subtlety  of  insight  which  often 
reaches  further  than  the  subtlety  of  Steele,  —  the  humor 
of  Hawthorne  presents  traits  so  fine  as  to  be  almost  too 
excellent  for  popularity,  as,  to  every  one  who  has  at- 
tempted their  criticism,  they  are  too  refined  for  state- 


THE    LUDICROUS   SIDE   OF   LIFE  155 

ment.  The  brilliant  atoms  flit,  hover,  and  glance  before 
our  minds,  but  the  remote  sources  of  their  ethereal  light 
lie  beyond  our  analysis,  — 

"  And  no  speed  of  ours  avails 
To  hunt  upon  their  shining  trails." 

And  now  let  us  breathe  a  benison  to  these,  our  mirthful 
benfelactors,  these  fine  revellers  among  human  weak- 
nesses, these  stern,  keen  satirists  of  human  depravity. 
Wherever  Humor  smiles  away  the  fretting  thoughts  of 
care,  or  supplies  that  antidote  which  cleanses 

"  The  stuffed  bosom  of  that  perilous  stuff 
Which  weighs  upon  the  heart,"  — 

wherever  Wit  riddles  folly,  abases  pride,  or  stings  iniqui- 
ty, —  there  glides  the  cheerful  spirit,  or  glitters  the  flash- 
ing thought,  of  these  bright  enemies  of  stupidity  and 
gloom.  Thanks  to  them,  hearty  thanks,  for  teaching  us 
that  the  ludicrous  side  of  life  is  its  wicked  side  no  less 
than  its  foolish  ;  that,  in  a  lying  world,  there  is  still  no 
mercy  for  falsehood ;  that  Guilt,  however  high  it  may 
lift  its  brazen  front,  is  never  beyond  the  lightnings  of 
Scorn ;  and  that  the  lesson  they  teach  agrees  with  the 
lesson  taught  by  all  experience,  —  that  life  in  harmony 
with  reason  is  the  only  life  safe  from  laughter,  that  life 
in  harmony  with  virtue  is  the  only  life  safe  from  con- 
tempt. 


GENIUS/ 


THERE  is  one  law  inwoven  into  the  constitution  of 
things,  which  declares  that  force  of  mind  and  character 
must  rule  the  world.  This  truth  glares  out  upon  us 
from  daily  life,  from  history,  from  science,  art,  letters, 
from  all  the  agencies  which  influence  conduct  and 
opinion.  The  whole  existing  order  of  things  is  one 
vast  monument  to  the  supremacy  of  mind.  The  exte- 
rior appearance  of  human  life  is  but  the  material  em- 
bodiment, the  substantial  expression,  of  thought,  —  the 
hieroglyphic  writing  of  the  soul.  The  fixed  facts  of 
society,  laws,  institutions,  positive  knowledge,  were  once 
ideas  in  a  projector's  brain — thoughts  which  have  been 
forced  into  facts.  The  scouted  hypothesis  of  the  fifteenth 
century  is  the  time-honored  institution  of  the  nineteenth ; 
the  heresy  of  yesterday  is  the  commonplace  of  to-day. 
We  perceive,  in  every  stage  of  this  great  movement,  a 
certain  vital  force,  a  spiritual  power,  to  which  we  give 

*  Delivered  before  the  Boston  Mercantile  Library  Association, 
February,  1848. 


GENIUS.  157 

the  name  of  Genius.  From  the  period  when  our  present 
civilized  races  ran  wild  and  naked  in  the  woods,  and 
dined  and  supped  on  each  other,  to  the  present  time,  the 
generality  of  mankind  have  been  contented  with  things 
as  they  were.  A  small  number  have  conceived  of  some- 
thing better,  or  something  new.  From  these  come  the 
moti9.rrand  ferment  of  life  ;  to  them  we  owe  it  that  exist- 
ence is  not  a  bog  but  a  stream.  These  are  men  of  genius. 
There  are,  therefore,  two  fields  for  human  thought 
and  action,  the  actual  and  the  possible,  the  realized 
and  the  real.  In  the  actual,  the  tangible,  the  real- 
ized, the  vast  proportion  of  mankind  abide.  The  great 
region  of  the  possible,  whence  all  discovery,  invention, 
creation,  proceed,  and  which  is  to  the  actual  as  a 
universe  to  a  planet,  is  the  chosen  region  of  Genius.  As 
almost  everything  which  is  now  actual  was  once  only 
possible,  as  our  present  facts  and  axioms  were  originally 
inventions  or  discoveries,  it  is,  under  God,  to  Genius  that 
we  owe  our  present  blessings.  In  the  past,  it  created  the 
present;  in  the  present,  it  is  creating  the  future.  It 
builds  habitations  for  us,  but  its  own  place  is  on  the  van- 
ishing points  of  human  intelligence,  — 

"  A  motion  toiling  in  the  gloom, 
The  spirit  of  the  years  to  come, 
Yearning  to  mix  itself  with  life." 

The  sphere  and  the  influence  of  Genius  it  is  easier  to 


158  GENIUS. 

ascertain  than  to  define  its  nature.  What  is  Genius  ? 
It  has  been  often  defined,  but  each  definition  has  included 
but  a  portion  of  its  phenomena.  According  to  Dr.  John- 
son, it  is  general  force  of  mind  accidentally  directed  to  a 
particular  pursuit ;  but  this  does  not  cover  the  compre- 
hensive genius  of  Shakspeare,  Leibnitz  and  Goethe ; 
and,  besides,  accident,  circumstance,  do  not  determine 
the  direction  of  narrower  minds,  but  simply  furnish  the 
occasion  on  which  an  inward  tendency  is  manifested. 
The  most  popular  definition  is  that  of  Coleridge,  who 
calls  genius  the  power  of  carrying  the  feelings  of  child- 
hood into  the  powers  of  manhood.  Such  a  power  may 
indicate  the  genius  of  Coleridge  and  Wordsworth,  but 
did  Napoleon  conquer  at  Austerlitz,  Newton  discover  the 
law  of  gravitation,  Shakspeare  create  Macbeth,  by  carry- 
ing the  feelings  of  childhood  into  the  powers  of  man- 
hood ?  This  mode  of  defining  by  individual  instances 
is  like  drawing  a  map  of  Massachusetts,  and  calling  it  the 
globe  —  a  thing  we  are  very  apt  to  do. 

Indeed,  Genius  has  commonly  been  incompletely  de- 
fined, because  each  definition  has  been  but  a  description 
of  some  order  of  genius.  A  true  definition  would  be  a 
generalization,  made  up  from  many  minds,  and  broad 
enough  to  include  all  the  results  of  genius  in  action  and 
thought.  Genius  is  not  a  single  power,  but  a  combina- 
tion of  great  powers.  It  reasons,  but  it  is  not  reasoning 


GENIUS.  159 

it  judges,  but  it  is  not  judgment ;  it  imagines,  but  it  is 
not  imagination ;  it  feels  deeply  and  fiercely,  but  it  is  not 
passion.  It  is  neither,  because  it  is  all.  It  is  another 
name  for  the  perfection  of  human  nature,  for  Genius  is 
not  a  fact  but  an  ideal.  It  is  nothing  less  than  the 
possession  of  all  the  powers  and  impulses  of  humanity, 
in  £heir  greatest  possible  strength  and  most  harmonious 
combination;  and  the  genius  of  any  particular  man  is 
great  in  proportion  as  he  approaches  this  ideal  of  univer- 
sal genius.  Conceive  of  a  mind  in  which  the  powers  of 
Napoleon  and  Howard,  Dante  and  Newton,  Luther  and 
Shakspeare,  Kant  and  Fulton,  were  so  combined  as  to 
act  in  perfect  harmony ;  a  mind,  vital  in  every  part,  con- 
ceiving everything  with  intensity  and  yet  conceiving 
everything  under  its  due  relations,  as  swift  in  its  volitions 
as  in  its  thoughts,  —  conceive  of  a  mind  like  this,  and 
you  will  have  a  definition  of  genius.  As  it  is,  it  requires 
the  energies  of  all  men  of  genius  to  produce  the  results 
of  genius.  It  exists  somewhat  in  fragments.  No  one 
human  mind  comprehends  all  its  elements.  The  nearest 
approach  to  universality  of  genius  in  intellect  is  Shaks- 
peare ;  in  will,  Napoleon ;  in  harmony  of  combination, 
Washington.  It  is  singular  that  Washington  is  not 
generally  classed  among  men  of  genius.  Lord  Brougham 
declares  him  to  be  the  greatest  man  that  ever  lived,  but 
of  moderate  talents,  —  as  if  being  the  soul  of  a  revolution 


160  GENIUS. 

and  the  creator  of  a  country,  did  not  suppose  energies 
equal  to  those  employed  in  the  creation  of  a  poem,  —  as 
if  there  were  any  other  certain  test  of  genius  but  its 
influence,  any  other  measure  of  the  power  of  a  cause 
but  the  magnitude  of  its  effects ! 

But  to  return.  Genius,  in  its  highest  meaning,  being 
thus  an  Ideal,  which  the  most  powerful  natures  have  but 
approached,  which,  while  it  comprehends  all  men  of 
genius,  is  itself  comprehended  by  none,  the  question  still 
arises,  what  common  quality  distinguishes  men  of  genius 
from  other  men,  in  practical  life,  in  science,  in  letters,  in 
every  department  of  human  thought  and  action  ?  This 
common  quality  is  vital  energy  of  mind,  —  inherent, 
original  force  of  thought  and  vitality  of  conception ;  a 
quality  equally  distinguishing  the  genius  of  action  and 
meditation,  making  the  mind  in  which  it  abides  alive, 
and  capable  of  communicating  intellectual  and  moral  life 
to  others.  Men  in  whom  this  energy  glows  seem  to 
spurn  the  limitations  of  matter;  to  dive  beneath  the 
forms  and  appearances  to  the  spirit  of  things ;  to  leap  the 
gulf  which  separates  positive  knowledge  from  discovery, 
the  actual  from  the  possible ;  and,  in  their  grasp  of  spir- 
itual realities,  in  their  intense  life,  they  seem  to  demon- 
strate the  immortality  of  the  soul  that  burns  within 
them.  They  give  palpable  evidence  of  infinite  capacity, 
of  indefinite  power  of  growth.  It  seems  a  mockery  to 


GENIUS.  161 

limit  their  life  by  years,  —  to  suppose  that  fiery  essence 
can  ever  hum  out  or  be  extinguished.  This  life,  this 
energy,  this  uprising,  aspiring  flame  of  thought,  — 

"This  mind,  this  spirit,  this  Promethean  spark, 
This  lightning  of  their  being,"  — 

has  been  variously  called  power  of  combination,  inven- 
tion^'creation,  insight;  but  in  the  last  analysis  it  is 
resolved  into  vital  energy  of  soul,  to  think  and  to  do. 

This  quality  of  genius  is  sometimes  difficult  to  be 
distinguished  from  talent,  because  high  genius  includes 
talent.  It  is  talent  and  something  more.  The  usual 
distinction  between  genius  and  talent  is,  that  one  repre- 
sents creative  thought,  the  other  practical  skill ;  one 
invents,  the  other  applies.  But  the  truth  is,  that  high 
genius  applies  its  own  inventions  better  than  talent  alone 
can  do.  A  man  who  has  mastered  the  higher  mathe- 
matics does  not  on  that  account  lose  his  knowledge  of 
arithmetic.  Hannibal,  Napoleon,  Shakspeare,  Newton, 
Scott,  Burke,  Arkwright,  —  were  they  not  men  of  talent 
as  well  as  men  of  genius  ?  Because  a  great  man  does 
not  always  do  what  many  smaller  men  can  often  do  as 
well,  smaller  men  must  not,  therefore,  affect  to  pity  him 
as  a  visionary,  and  pretend  to  lick  into  shape  his  form- 
less theories. 

But  still  there  doubtless  is  a  marked  distinction  be- 
tween men  of  genius  and  men  simply  of  talent.  Talent 
11 


162  GENIUS. 

repeats  ;  Genius  creates.  Talent  is  a  cistern  ;  Genius,  a 
fountain.  Talent  deals  with  the  actual,  with  discovered 
and  realized  truths,  analyzing,  arranging,  combining, 
applying  positive  knowledge,  and  in  action  looking  to 
precedents.  Genius  deals  with  the  possible,  creates  new 
combinations,  discovers  new  laws,  and  acts  from  an 
insight  into  principles.  Talent  jogs  to  conclusions  to 
which  Genius  takes  giant  leaps.  Talent  accumulates 
knowledge,  and  has  it  packed  up  in  the  memory  ;  Genius 
assimilates  it  with  its  own  substance,  grows  with  every 
new  accession,  and  converts  knowledge  into  power. 
Talent  gives  out  what  it  has  taken  in  ;  Genius,  what  has 
risen  from  its  unsounded  wells  of  living  thought.  Talent, 
in  difficult  situations,  strives  to  untie  knots,  which  Genius 
instantly  cuts,  with  one  swift  decision.  Talent  is  full  of 
thoughts ;  Genius,  of  thought :  one  has  definite  acquisi- 
tions ;  the  other,  indefinite  power. 

But  the  most  important  distinction  between  the  two 
qualities  is  this  :  —  one,  in  conception,  follows  mechanical 
processes ;  the  other,  vital.  Talent  feebly  conceives  ob- 
jects with  the  senses  and  understanding ;  Genius,  fusing 
all  its  powers  together  in  the  alembic  of  an  impassioned 
imagination,  clutches  everything  in  the  concrete,  con- 
ceives objects  as  living  realities,  gives  body  to  spiritual 
abstractions  and  spirit  to  bodily  appearances,  and,  like 


GENIUS.  16? 

"  A  gate  of  steel 

Fronting  the  sun,  receives  and  renders  back 
His  figure  and  his  heat ! " 

It  is  thus  the  glorious  prerogative  of  Genius  to  conceive 
and  to  present  everything  as  alive;  and  here  is  the  secret 
of  its  power.  It  leads  and  sways  because  it  communi- 
cates Jiving  energy,  and  strikes  directly  at  the  soul,  — 
searching  out  the  very  sources  of  our  volitions,  bowing 
our  weak  wills  before  its  strong  arm,  awakening,  animat- 
ing, forcing  us  along  its  path  of  thought,  or  over  its  waves 
of  passion.  It  commands  us  because  it  knows  better 
than  we  what  is  within  us.  Soul  itself,  it  knows  that, 
in  spite  of  our  contemptible  disguises,  we  too  have  souls 
which  must  leap  up  at  its  voice,  and  follow  whithersoever 
it  leads.  It  claims  its  rightful  mastery  over  our  spirits, 
by  awakening  us  to  a  sense  of  our  spiritual  existence. 
It  speaks  to  us,  in  our  captivity,  in  the  long-forgotten 
language  of  our  native  land.  It  sees  us  wrapped  up  in 
the  dead  cerements  of  custom,  rusting  away  in  the  sep- 
ulchre of  being,  and  it  cries  to  us,  —  "  Come  forth  ! "  It 
speaks  to  us,  and  we  hear;  it  touches  us,  and  we  spring 
to  our  feet.  A  crowd  of  spirits  from  the  realms  of  the 
deathless  come  thronging  around  us ;  —  from  the  battle- 
field, where  Liberty  went  down  under  the  brutal  hoofs 
of  Power,  its  immortal  image  trampled  in  the  dust, — 
from  the  legislative  hall,  where,  amid  the  collision  of 


164  GENIUS. 

adverse  intellects,  the  orator  poured  his  torrent  of  fire,  — 
from  the  rack  and  the  stake,  where  the  spirit  of  man 
chanted  rapturous  hymns  in  its  fierce  agonies,  and  met 
death  smiling,  —  from  the  cell  of  the  thinker,  where 
mind  grappled  with  the  mysterious  unknown,  piercing, 
with  its  thought  of  light,  the  dark  veil  of  unrealized 
knowledge  and  possible  combinations ;  —  from  every 
scene  where  the  soul  has  been  really  alive,  arid  impa- 
tiently tossed  aside  the  material  conditions  which  would 
stifle  or  limit  its  energies,  come  the  Genii  of  Thought 
and  Action,  to  rouse  us  from  ouj-  sleep  of  death,  to  tear 
aside  the  thin  delusions  of  our  conceit,  and  to  pour  into 
the  shrunken  veins  of  our  discrowned  spirits  the  fresh 
tides  of  mental  life.  It  is  this  influence  of  Genius  which 
has  given  motion  and  progress  to  society;  prevented  the 
ossification  of  the  human  heart  and  brain  ;  and  though, 
in  its  processes,  it  may  not  ever  have  followed  the  rules 
laid  down  in  primers,  it  has  at  least  saved  history  from 
being  the  region  of  geology,  and  our  present  society  from 
being  a  collection  of  fossil  remains. 

Thus,  of  the  three  requisitions  of  Genius,  the  first  is 
soul,  and  the  second,  soul,  and  the  third,  soul.  We  have 
already  seen  that  almost  all  genius  is  particular,  with  an 
inborn  direction  to  particular  pursuits.  The  tendency 
of  its  vital  force  is  generally  perceived  in  childhood.  I 
can  devote  but  little  space  to  the  youth  of  genius,  though 


GENIUS.  265 

the  subject  is  tempting,  and  furnishes  numberless  anec- 
dotes of  the  earnestness,  the  intensity,  with  which  the 
great  mind  early  abandons  itself  to  its  irrepressible  im- 
pulses. Carnot,  who,  as  one  of  the  Committee  of  Public 
Saiety  during  the  French  Revolution,  directed  the  opera- 
tions of  fourteen  armies,  and  hurled  back  the  tide  of 
invasion  which  came  rolling  in  over  the  Alps,  the  Pyre- 
nees and  the  Rhine,  was  taken,  when  a  child,  to  the 
theatre,  where  some  siege  was  clumsily  represented. 
Seeing  that  the  attacking  party  were  so  placed  as  to  be 
commanded  by  a  battery,  he  astonished  the  audience  by 
demanding  that  the  general  should  change  his  position, 
and  cried  out  to  him  that  his  men  were  in  fire.  —  The 
young  genius  early  exults  in  the  contemplation  of  power 
and  beauty.  During  Scott's  childhood,  a  frightful  thun- 
der-storm raged  at  Edinburgh,  which  made  his  brothers 
and  the  domestics  huddle  together  in  one  room,  shiver- 
ing with  fear  at  every  peal.  Young  Walter  was  found 
lying  on  his  back  in  the  garden,  the  rain  pitilessly  pelt- 
ing his  face,  while  he,  almost  convulsed  with  delight, 
shouted  at  every  flash,  "  bonnie  !  bonnie  ! "  Schiller 
was  found  by  his  father,  on  a  similar  occasion,  perched 
upon  a  tree ;  and  on  being  harshly  questioned  as  to  his 
object,  whimpered  out  that  he  wanted  to  see  where  the 
thunder  came  from.  Byron's  first  verses,  when  a  child 
of  four  or  five  years,  displayed  the  same  perverseness 


166  GENIUS. 

and  unbridled  vehemence  which  afterwards  flamed  out 
in  Manfred  and  Cain.  An  old  lady  near  his  house,  who 
entertained  the  belief  that  on  her  death  her  soul  would 
reside  in  the  moon,  bothered  him  considerably  in  his 
childish  pranks.  He  revenged  himself  in  four  lines  :  — 

"  In  Nottingham  County  there  lives,  at  Swan  Green, 
As  curst  an  old  lady  as  ever  was  seen  ; 
And  when  she  does  die,  which  I  hope  will  be  soon, 
She  firmly  believes  she  will  go  to  the  moon." 

It  would  be  needless  to  multiply  instances,  familiar  to 
everybody,  that  the  man's  genius  is  born  with  him. 
Legislator,  reformer,  soldier,  poet,  artist,  thinker,  —  the 
child  is  still  "  the  father  of  the  man."  In  some  instances, 
it  must  be  admitted,  the  whole  man  does  not  grow.  Na- 
poleon's youth  prefigured  his  maturity,  and  something 
else.  The  sovereign  who  crushed  the  heart  of  his  queen 
in  his  mailed  hand,  was  once  a  man  of  sentiment. 
When  quite  young,  he  fell  in  love  with  a  young  maiden ; 
they  contrived  little  meetings ;  and  he  afterwards  averred 
that  their  whole  happiness  then  consisted  in  eating  cher- 
ries together. 

We  have  seen  that  genius  is  vital  energy  of  soul.  In 
itself  it  supposes  a  harmonious  combination  of  will,  intel- 
lect and  sensibility  ;  but,  as  manifested  in  men  of  genius, 
this  combination  is  not  perfect.  Hence  the  division  of 
powerful  natures  into  men  of  action  and  men  of  medita« 


GENIUS.  167 

tion;  men  in  whom  will  predominates,  and  men  in  whom 
thought  predominates.  In  the  one  case,  the  vital  energy 
of  the  mind  takes  a  practical  direction,  works  visibly  on 
society,  and  produces  events.  In  the  other,  it  takes  the 
direction  of  meditation,  influences  society  by  methods 
more  strictly  spiritual,  and  produces  poetry,  science,  the 
fine  fffts,  everything  that  stimulates  and  gratifies  the 
inward  sense  of  truth,  beauty,  and  power. 

And  first  let  us  refer  to  the  genius  of  action,  to  genius 
whose  thoughts  are  read  in  deeds.  Men  of  action  may 
be  classed  in  three  divisions  :  —  those  who  exercise  their 
energies  for  what  they  deem  the  truth  ;  those  who  exer- 
cise them  for  personal  interest  and  ambition  ;  and  those 
in  whom  selfish  and  disinterested  motives  are  strangely 
blended.  The  greatness  of  action  includes  immoral  as 
well  as  moral  greatness,  —  Cortes  and  Napoleon,  as  well 
as  Luther  and  Washington.  Its  highest  exemplification 
is  where  energy  of  will  carries  out  a  great  original 
thought  to  a  practical  result,  with  uprightness  of  moral 
intention  ;  and  perhaps  the  noblest  example  of  this  is  in 
Columbus.  Its  lowest  exemplification  is  where  great  en- 
ergies of  will  are  divorced  from  conscience  and  human- 
ity; and  perhaps  the  lowest  example  of  this  is  in  Pizarro. 
But  neither  by  the  side  of  Columbus  nor  Pizarro  can  we 
place  the  moral  trimmer,  without  any  definite  purpose, 
whose  heart  is  continually  aching  for  the  crimes  of  the 


168  GENIUS. 

bad,  but  whose  will  is  too  infirm  to  battle  bravely  for  the 
good.  Such  a  person  may  shine  among  well  meaning 
people,  but  his  claims  to  greatness  of  any  kind  are  ridic- 
ulous. Pizarro  was  a  buccaneer,  but  he  had,  at  least,  an 
object,  which  was  to  him  dearer  than  life,  and  to  compass 
it  he  displayed  the  valor  of  a  knight  and  the  endurance  of 
a  martyr.  How  strangely  does  his  conduct  at  the  island 
of  Gallo  contrast  with  the  tongue-valiant  cowardice 
which  characterizes  the  feebly  good !  After  suffering  all 
that  fatigue,  famine  and  pestilence  could  inflict,  short  of 
death,  a  vessel  arrived  which  offered  to  carry  him  and 
his  companions  back  to  Panama.  To  go  was  to  abandon 
forever  the  project  of  conquering  and  plundering  Peru. 
Pizarro  drew  his  sword,  and  traced  a  line  on  the  sand 
with  it  from  east  to  west.  Then  turning  to  the  south, 
he  said  to  his  band  of  immortal  pirates  :  —  "  Friends  and 
comrades !  on  that  side  are  toil,  hunger,  nakedness,  the 
drenching  storm,  desertion  and  death ;  on  this  side,  ease 
and  pleasure.  There  lies  Peru  with  its  riches ;  here, 
Panama  with  its  poverty.  Choose,  each  man,  what  best 
becomes  a  brave  Castilian.  For  my  part,  I  go  to  the 
south."  Now,  as  long  as  bad  men  display  qualities  like 
these,  so  long  will  they  rule ;  for  to  qualities  like  these 
is  given  the  dominion  of  the  world.  Such  men,  to  be 
checked,  are  not  to  be  talked  about,  but  to  be  wrestled 
with,  —  to  be  bravely  met  by  superior  force  of  will,  and 


GENIUS.  169 

overthrown.  Never  will  this  be  done  by  the  moral  bab- 
ble of  men  who  wish  to  serve  God,  and  wish,  at  the  same 
time,  to  live  comfortably  all  their  days.  Well  has  the 
great  Christian  poet  of  the  age  affirmed,  — 

"  The  law 

By  which  mankind  now  suffers  is  most  just. 
*  **'  For,  by  superior  energies,  more  strict 
Affiance  in  each  other,  faith  more  firm 
ID  their  unhallowed  principles,  the  bad 
Have  fairly  earned  a  victory  o'er  the  weak, 
The  vacillating,  inconsistent  good." 

The  great  characteristic  of  men  of  active  genius  is  a 
sublime  self-confidence,  springing,  not  from  self-conceit, 
but  from  an  intense  identification  of  the  man  with  his 
object,  which  lifts  him  altogether  above  the  fear  of  dan- 
ger and  death,  which  gives  to  his  enterprise  a  character 
of  insanity  to  the  common  eye,  and  which  communicates 
an  almost  superhuman  audacity  to  his  will.  Men  of  this 
stamp  seem  to  have  a  clear  and  bright  vision  of  what  is 
hidden  from  other  men,  and  to  push  instinctively  forward, 
through  every  obstacle,  to  its  attainment.  They  seem  to 
hear  voices  crying  to  them  from  the  mysterious  unknown, 
and  to  answer  the  call  in  flashes  of  supernatural  energy. 
They  ever  give  the  impression  of  spirits,  to  whom  mate- 
rial obstacles  are  as  flax  in  the  fire.  Judge  from  their 
words  and  their  deeds,  and  you  would  suppose  their 


170  GENIUS. 

bodies  partook,  like  Milton's  angels,  of  incorporeal  sub- 
stance, which,  if  pierced  or  cloven,  would  instantly  re- 
unite. They  have  no  fear  of  death,  because  their  souls 
are  thoroughly  alive ;  and  the  idea  of  death  never  occurs 
to  a  live  mind.  In  following  the  career  of  one  of  these 
fierce  and  flashing  intelligences,  our  astonishment  finds 
vent  in  some  such  words  as  the  heroism  of  Duke  Sopho- 
cles forced  from  Fletcher's  honest  centurion : 

"  By  Romulus,  he  is  all  soul,  I  think  ; 
He  hath  no  flesh,  and  spirit  cannot  be  gyved." 

Such  men,  also,  dart  their  souls  into  vast  bodies  of  men, 
become  the  animating  spirit  of  great  enterprises,  and 
communicate  vitality  even  to  those  whose  submission 
they  enforce.  Every  soldier  in  the  army  of  Caesar  and 
Napoleon,  felt  the  soul  of  Caesar  or  Napoleon  glowing 
within  his  own  breast.  While  obeying  another  will,  new 
life  seemed  poured  into  his  own.  Audacity  and  a  beau- 
tiful contempt  of  death  breathe  and  burn  in  the  words 
and  deeds  of  such  commanders.  "  My  lads,"  said  Napo- 
leon to  some  raw  recruits,  "  you  must  not  fear  death  ; 
when  soldiers  brave  death,  they  drive  him  into  the 
enemy's  ranks."  The  great  Conde,  when  twice  repulsed 
with  frightful  slaughter  at  Fribourg,  led  his  soldiers  up 
in  person  to  the  mouths  of  the  enemy's  cannon,  and 
hurled  his  marshal's  baton  over  the  intrenchments. 
Nothing  could  resist  the  impetuosity  of  French  soldiers, 


GENIUS.  17J 

after  such  a  spur  had  been  given  to  their  energies. 
"Follow  my  plume!"  said  Henry  the  Fourth  to  his 
knights ;  —  "  you  will  always  find  it  on  the  road  to  vic- 
tory." "  Hang  thyself,  brave  Crillon,"  said  he,  in  the 
same  spirit  of  chivalry ;  "  we  have  fought  at  Arques,  and 
thou  wast  not  there."  Speak  thus  to  the  higher  senti- 
ments of  men  on  great  occasions,  and  you  will  find  their 
sSuls  will  instinctively  mount  up  to  their  native  region. 
When  the  -Spanish  Armada  threatened  England,  the 
Queen  of  England  spoke  to  her  troops  in  words  warm 
from  her  own  lion  heart.  She  did  not  tell  them  that  an 
invasion  would  prejudice  their  interests,  or  even  their 
liberties,  but  she  tvondered  that  Parma  and  proud  Spain 
should  dare  to  invade  her  dominions.  The  success  of 
Luther  was  in  a  great  degree  owing  to  his  indomitable 
will, —  a  will  which  forced  its  way  through  obstacles 
which  might  have  daunted  armies,  and  gave  to  his  char- 
acter that  moral  intensity,  which  fitted  him  to  be  the 
leader  in  what  Guizot  calls,  "  the  great  insurrection  of 
human  thought  against  authority."  When  advised  not 
to  go  to  a  city,  notoriously  thronged  with  his  enemies, 
he  said,  "  Were  there  as  many  devils  there  as  roof-tiles, 
I  would  on  ! "  This  is  the  feeling  of  the  great  reformer 
everywhere;  —  to  make  life  a  battle  for  the  truth;  to 
strike  heavier  blows  for  the  Right  than  others  can  for  the 
Wrong ;  in  one  word,  to  DARE  !  This  principle  has  been 


172  GENros. 

repeatedly  caricatured  by  those  who  have  pretended  to 
represent  it.  It  was  vilely  caricatured  in  that  infernal 
farce,  the  French  Revolution,  in  which  audacity  and 
mediocrity  formed  a  hideous  union.  But  it  is  no  less  the 
virtue  of  genius  because  it  is  the  vice  of  folly.  There  is 
a  great  difference  between  the  dogmatism  of  knowledge 
and  the  dogmatism  of  ignorance.  Kepler  might  say, 
that  if  God  had  waited  five  thousand  years  before  he  had 
raised  up  a  man  capable  of  comprehending  His  wonderful 
works,  he  could  wait  a  thousand  for  men  to  comprehend 
his  discoveries ;  but  such  language  as  this  is  impotent 
trash,  worthy  only  to  be  received  with  a  storm  of  hisses, 
when  uttered  by  pretentious  mediocrity. 

This  energy  and  audacity  of  will  characterizes  all  rul- 
ing public  men, —  statesmen,  generals,  reformers,  orators. 
In  the  great  orator,  especially,  it  is  seen  in  the  condensa- 
tion, the  burning  vehemence,  the  brief,  stern  strokes,  with 
which  he  pierces  through  the  reason  and  through  the 
passions  of  his  audience,  directly  at  their  volitions, — 
spurning,  trampling,  upon  all  opposing  wills,  hurrying  the 
souls  whom  he  has  taken  captive  onward,  ever  onward, 
to  the  insatiable  object  which  impatiently  beckons  in  the 
distance !  Demosthenes,  the  greatest  of  orators,  is  the 
great  master  of  this  intense  and  rapid  movement.  He 
never  repeats ;  never,  says  Brougham,  comes  back  upon 
the  ground,  "which  he  has  once  utterly  wasted  and 


GENIUS.  173 

withered  up  by  the  tide  of  fire  he  has  rolled  over  it." 
It  was  this  intense  will,  this  force  of  being,  which  chiefly 
distinguished  the  arrogant  and  ruling  genius  of  Chatham. 
He  cowed  those  whom  he  could  neither  convince  nor 
persuade.  A  country  member  of  Parliament  once  rose  to 
accuse  him  of  a  palpable  inconsistency  in  his  conduct. 
/He  had  hardly  mumbled  a  few  words  before  he  was 
looked  down  into  his  seat  by  the  steady  scorn  which 
blazed  upon  him  from  Chatham's  eye.  It  was  this  force 
which  gave  such  audacity  to  his  bursts  of  blended  opinion 
and  passion  —  as  in  that  well-known  exclamation  in  the 
House  of  Lords,  —  "They  tell  me  that  America  has 
resisted.  I  am  rejoiced  to  hear  it ! "  "  Sugar,  my 
lords,"  said  he,  on  another  occasion,  in  his  deep,  grave 
voice.  A  well-bred  sneer  instantly  smiled  on  the  lips  of 
his  noble  auditors,  at  the  disparity  between  the  term  and 
the  tone.  Chatham  saw  it,  kindled  at  the  insult,  and 
repeated  sugar  three  times,  in  his  fiercest  tones  and  with 
his  most  violent  gesticulations,  until  he  awed  them  into 
putting  on  civil  faces.  He  then  asked,  derisively,  "  "Who 
will  laugh  at  sugar  now?"  We  sometimes  see  this 
power  exercised  in  private  life,  and  controversies  settled 
by  force  of  will,  instead  of  force  of  argument.  Dr.  John- 
son wielded  it  with  admirable  energy.  The  records  of 
Robert  Hall's  conversation  boil  over  with  an  audacity  of 
expression,  which  cuts  clean  through  the  "  linen  decen- 


174  GENITTS. 

cies"  of  polite  life.     "  Mr.  Hall,"  said  one  of  his  parish- 
ioners,  "I  understand  you  are  going  to  marry  Miss 

." —  "  I  marry  Miss !     I  would  as  soon 

marry  Beelzebub's  eldest  daughter,  and  go  home  and  live 
with  the  old  folks."  Again,  speaking  of  Dr.  Ryland,  he 
exclaimed,  "  Why,  sir,  Dr.  Ryland  's  all  piety ;  all  piety 
together,  sir.  If  there  were  not  room  in  heaven,  God 
would  turn  out  an  archangel  for  him."  His  proposal  to 
his  housekeeper  had  a  similar  wildness.  "  Betty,  do  you 
love  the  Lord  Jesus  ?  "  —  "  Yes,  sir."  —  "  And  Betty,  do 
you  love  me  ? " — "  Yes,  sir."  They  were  married  at  once. 
Perhaps  the  most  wonderful  example  of  this  audacity 
In  a  mind  at  once  vast  and  flexible,  intense  and  compre- 
hensive, is  in  Caesar, — a  man  to  whose  commanding 
genius  empire  seemed  but  another  term  for  action. 
Compared  with  him,  Alexander  seems  but  a  hot-headed 
boy,  and  even  Napoleon  "pales  his  uneffectual  fire." 
The  amazing  strength  of  his  mind  is  not  so  remarkable 
as  its  plastic  character — the  ease  with  which  it  accom- 
modated itself  to  every  emergency  —  its  wonderful  fusion 
of  will,  intelligence  and  passion.  It  never  hardened  in 
any  part,  and  all  its  powers  were  thus  capable  of  instan- 
taneous concentration.  Though  his  determinations  were 
as  sure  as  they  were  swift,  we  still  never  speak  of  his 
iron  will,  feeling  that  such  a  term  would  not  express  its 
ethereal  strength,  and  its  felicity  of  adaptation  to  every 


GENIUS.  175 

occasion.  The  acts  of  Caesar  affect  us  like  unexpected 
flashes  of  imagination  in  a  great  poem.  At  the  age  of 
seventeen,  in  flying  from  the  power  of  Sylla,  he  fell  into 
the  clutches  of  pirates.  They  fixed  his  ransom  at  twenty 
talents.  "It  is  too  little,"  he  said;  "you  shall  have 
fifty ;  but  once  free,  I  will  crucify  every  one  of  you ;" 
and  he  did  it.  When  his  favorite  legion  mutinied,  he 
abandoned  them  before  they  could  abandon  him,  and  they 
followed  him  like  spaniels,  suing  for  forgiveness.  In 
Spain,  his  legions  would  obey  neither  his  entreaties  nor 
commands  to  attack  the  vast  army  opposed  to  them. 
But  they  knew  not  the  resources  of  their  commander. 
Seizing  a  shield,  he  cried,  "  I  will  die  here  ! "  and  rushed 
singly  upon  the  Spanish  ranks.  Two  hundred  arrows 
flew  against  him,  when  within  ten  paces  of  the  enemy,  — 
and  his  soldiers  could  not  but  charge  in  his  support.  At 
Rome,  when  he  heard  of  plots  to  assassinate  him,  he 
proudly  dismissed  his  guards,  and  ever  afterwards  walked 
through  the  streets  alone  and  unarmed.  Well  might  his 
"  honorable  murderers  "  have  wondered,  as  that  withered 
frame  lay  before  them,  pierced  with  twenty  stabs,  that  a 
body  so  worn  and  weak  could  have  contained  so  vast  and 
vehement  a  soul.  In  all  history  we  have  no  other 
instance  of  a  mind  of  such  ethereal  make,  divorced  from 
moral  principle.  The  Romans  thought  him  a  god,  and 
to  all  posterity  he  will  be  the  great,  bad  man  of  the  world. 


176  GENitrs. 

Interpenetrate  the  will  of  Luther,  the  benevolence  of 
Howard,  the  religion  of  Fenelon,  with  the  mind  of 
Goethe,  and  you  would  have  a  man  as  resistless  for  duty 
as  Ceesar  was  for  glory.  But,  you  may  say,  this  military 
courage  is  not  spiritual,  but  physical.  Let  us  hear  the 
testimony  of  one  qualified  to  speak  to  this  point,  —  of 
one  who  was  both  warrior  and  writer,  —  the  testimony 
of  the  great  tragic  poet  of  Greece.  How  run  the  lines 
written  by  himself  to  serve  for  his  own  epitaph  ? 

"Athenian  ^Eschylus,  Eurphorian's  son, 

Buried  in  Geta's  fields,  these  words  declare  ; 
His  deeds  are  registered  at  Marathon, 
Known  to  tne  deep-haired  Mede  who  met  him  there." 

Have  we  not  here  the  same  stern,  fiery,  invulnerable 
soul,  which  clothed  in  verse  of  such  imperishable  grand- 
eur the  awful  agonies  of  the  chained  Prometheus  ? 

But  to  return  :  Brutus  has  been  placed  above  Csesar 
in  greatness  by  those  who  write  books  for  children. 
Now,  Brutus  had  no  genius ;  was  simply  a  proud, 
inflexible,  hard-minded  and  narrow-minded  patrician, 
whose  notion  of  liberty  was  below  that  of  Russia's 
autocrat,  and  whose  notion  of  virtue  was  worse  than  his 
notion  of  liberty.  "Virtue,"  said  he,  just  before  his 
death,  —  "vain  word,  futile  shadow,  slave  of  chance' 
Alas !  I  believed  in  thee  ! " — Here  a  heroical  soul !  Hen 
a  great  moral  genius  !  Why,  Csesar  would  not  have  said 


GENIUS.  177 

such  a  thing  even  of  vice !  No  man  who  had  vitally  con- 
ceived virtue,  as  a  living  reality,  —  ever  identified  him- 
self with  it,  —  could  thus  have  mocked  its  awful  immor- 
tality with  his  peevish  atheism.  He  called  virtue  a 
word,  because  to  him  it  was  a  barren  proposition  about 
virtue,  to  which  his  understanding  assented,  —  not  a  liv- 
igTp  realization  of  virtue,  which  his  whole  nature  adored. 
How  mean  does  such  a  man  appear  by  the  side  of  such 
a  woman  as  Joan  of  Arc,  the  saint  of  France  !  How 
much  more  force  dwelt  in  the  little  peasant  maiden  than 
in  Rome's  proud  patrician !  She,  in  the  might  and  the 
simplicity  of  her  nature,  identified  herself  with  duty, 
and,  armed  in  her  intelligence  and  faith,  was,  in  her 
sphere,  as  resistless  as  Caesar,  —  because  her  mind  was 
as  vital.  From  the  time  her  soul  first  caught  the  sound 
of  the  cathedral  bells,  chiming  above  her  cottage  home, 
to  the  period  when  she  fell  into  the  gripe  of  the  grim 
English  wolves,  her  life  was  one  expression  of  holiness, 
purity  and  action.  Viewed  in  connection  with  the 
Satanic  passions  of  that  dark  period,  she  seems  to  de- 
scend upon  her  age  as  a  heavenly  visitant,  with  celestial 
beauty  and  celestial  strength.  France  has  no  nobler 
boast  than  her  heroic  genius ;  England  no  fouler  stain 
than  her  brutal  murder.  She  is  among  the  greatest  of 
the  great  of  action.  It  is  almost  needless  to  say  that  in 
English  history  she  appears  variously  as  witch,  wanton, 
12 


178  GENIUS. 

sorceress  and  fanatic,  — not  as  the  wisest,  purest,  ablest 
intelligence  of  her  time. 

We  have  seen,  so  far,  that  vital  energy  of  soul  is  the 
great  characteristic  of  the  genius  of  action.  It  is  not 
less  so  of  the  genius  of  meditation.  We  call  the  one 
force  of  character ;  the  other,  force  of  mind :  but  vital 
thought  is  at  heart  of  both.  True  depth  and  strength 
of  character  is  in  proportion  to  the  living  spiritual  prin- 
ciple within  the  man.  Force,  power,  dominion,  are 
traced  in  letters  of  fire  on  the  brow  of  the  thinker,  as  on 
the  crown  of  the  actor.  From  both  come  those  kindling, 
quickening  influences,  which  move  the  world.  But  to 
the  thinker,  the  range  of  the  man  of  action  is  all  too  nar- 
row to  satisfy  the  creative  energy  of  his  intellect.  The 
reformer,  the  soldier,  the  patriot,  each  commonly  over- 
estimates the  importance  of  his  special  object,  from  not 
vitally  conceiving  its  relations  as  well  as  itself.  Shaks- 
peare  cannot  do  the  work  of  Luther,  because  he  is  on 
an  eminence  where  Luther's  work  falls  into  its  right 
relations  to  other  possible  reforms,  which  Luther  feebly 
conceives  or  fiercely  underestimates.  To  Luther  it  is 
the  thing  to  be  done ;  to  Shakspeare,  only  one  thing  to 
be  done.  Shakspeare,  again,  would  not  expend  his  ener- 
gies for  the  objects  of  Napoleon,  because  he  sees  further 
and  deeper  than  Napoleon  into  their  nature.  Yet  we 
are  not  from  this  to  conclude  that  the  force  exercised  in 


GENIUS.  179 

the  region  whence  events  indirectly  spring,  is  not  as 
great  as  that  exercised  in  the  region  whence  events 
directly  spring.  Influence  is  the  measure  of  power ;  and 
he  must  be  a  dealer  in  hardy  assertions  who  shall  say 
that  the  influence  on  mankind  of  men  of  action  has  been 
greater  than  men  of  thought.  In  truth,  action  is  influ- 
ential, as  meditation  is  influential,  just  in  proportion  to 
the  vital  thought  it  embodies  and  represents. 

It  may  be  as  well  here  to  mention  a  common  preju- 
dice against  genius,  that  it  is  a  quality  of  idle,  lazy  men ; 
of  clever  vagabonds,  who  have  a  knack  of  seizing  some 
things  by  intuition  which  others  obtain  by  logic ;  of  men. 
who  spontaneously  perceive  what  others  laboriously  inves- 
tigate. If  a  child  flouts  at  parental  authority,  abhors 
study,  investigates  the  condition  of  hen-roosts,  and  prac- 
tically illustrates  new  views  of  property,  his  sloth,  trickery 
and  thieving,  are  apt  to  be  laid  to  his  genius.  All  mis- 
erable pretenders,  poetasters,  quacks,  ranters,  —  disciples 
of  disorder  everywhere,  —  are  considered  to  be  fools  and 
vagabonds  in  virtue  of  their  genius.  The  general  feeling 
is  well  expressed  in  an  anecdote  told  of  Mason.  Some 
person  brought  him  a  subscription  paper  for  the  poems  of 
Ann  Yearsley,  the  inspired  milk-maid,  describing  her  as 
a  heaven-born  genius.  He  gave  four-and-sixpence, — 
"  four  shillings,"  he  said,  "  for  charity,  and  the  odd  six- 
pence for  her  heaven-born  genius."  The  work-house, 


180  GENIUS. 

the  jail,  the  penitentiary,  are  considered  to  be  full  of  men 
of  genius.  The  quality  is  held  to  be  naturally  opposed 
to  order,  to  common-sense,  and  to  worldly  success. 
Even  where  a  man  like  Burns,  or  Otway,  or  Cowper, 
filled  a  nation  with  his  fame,  it  is  still  remembered  that 
Otway  starved  to  death,  that  Burns  died  drunk,  that 
Cowper  died  mad.  "  There 's  small  choice,"  cries  Medi- 
ocrity, "in  rotten  apples."  People  therefore  consider 
genius,  at  the  best,  a  doubtful  benefit :  — 

"  The  booby  father  craves  a  booby  son, 
And  by  Heaven's  blessing  thinks  himself  undone." 

Now,  admitting  that  Genius,  working  in  bad  organiza- 
tions, and  exposed  to  a  continual  conflict  with  surround- 
ing malignity  and  stupidity,  may  end  in  "  despondency 
and  madness," — may  seem,  as  Rousseau's  did  to  Byron, 

"A  tree 

On  fire  with  lightning,  with  ethereal  flame 
Kindled  and  blasted,"  — 

yet  the  fault  is  not  in  having  too  much  genius,  but  in 
not  having  genius  enough.  Take  Milton,  the  invincible ; 
that  adamantine  strength  of  will  which  made  such 
wild  work  among  the  sensualists  and  renegades  of  his 
time,  —  was  not  that  a  portion  of  his  genius  ?  When  a 
great  man  sinks  into  despondency,  or  fear,  or  inaction, 
his  genius  slumbers  or  has  departed.  He  is  an  Achilles, 


GENIUS.  181 

dozing  in  luxurious  sloth,  while  the  plains  are  ringing 
with  war ;  and  to  him  should  be  addressed  the  trumpet 
call  of  Patroc.us  :  — 

"  Sweet, 

Rouse  thyself ;  and  the  weak,  wanton  Cupid 
Shall  from  your  neck  unloose  his  amorous  fold, 
And,  like  a  dew-drop  from  the  lion's  mane, 
*""**  Be  shook  to  air !  " 

Indeed,  genius  in  thought  supposes  energy  of  will  to 
rouse  energies  of  intellect,  and  is  the  exact  opposite  of 
laziness  or  indulgence.  It  is  self-directed  power;  energy, 
which,  if  it  do  not  come  spontaneously,  must  be  induced. 
As  far  as  it  is  genius  it  is  labor,  the  hardest  work  that 
man  can  do,  and  its  discoveries  and  combinations  are 
earned  by  the  very  sweat  of  the  brain.  It  is  true,  thoughts 
seem  sometimes  to  fall  into  the  mind  of  the  poet,  like 
stray  birds  of  paradise ;  but  be  sure  they  have  been  lured 
thither  by  the  poet's  potent  spells.  Again,  in  the  exter- 
nal activity  of  men  of  genius  there  are  great  differences, 
from  the  physical  inertia  of  Thomson,  lazily  biting  the 
ripe  side  of  a  peach  on  the  tree,  his  hands  thrust  immov- 
ably in  his  pockets,  to  the  hurricane  movement  of  Byron, 
who  had,  if  we  may  believe  Mr.  Gilfillan,  "  the  activity 
of  a  scalded  fiend ; "  yet  the  Seasons  were  as  much 
the  result  of  inward  energy  as  Childe  Harold.  But  the 
thought  of  genius,  you  may  say,  comes  spontaneously, 


182  GENIUS. 

—  swift  as  lightning.  Yes ;  but  that  gathering  together 
of  forces,  which  precedes  and  causes  the  lightning, — what 
is  that  ?  The  thought  of  the  law  of  gravitation  flashed 
acrors  the  mind  of  Newton  ;  but  the  mental  labor  which 
for  years  preceded  it,  the  millions  of  thoughts  which 
came  from  that  exhaustless  fountain  before  the  right  one 
flashed,  —  there  was  the  work  of  a  giant.  The  mind  of 
genius,  being  vital,  grows  with  exercise;  assimilates 
knowledge  into  the  very  life-blood  of  thought,  every  new 
acquisition  becoming  additional  power ;  and  though  the 
last  result  may  seem  simple,  the  processes  by  which  it  is 
mastered  are  complex  and  mighty.  In  view  of  the  diffi- 
culties to  be  overcome,  and  the  annoyances  to  be  tossed 
aside,  by  the  original  thinker,  Buffon  defined  genius  as 
patience.  In  the  power  of  patient  labor,  Newton  mod- 
estly saw  the  difference  between  himself  and  other  men. 
He  did  not  consider  that  this  power  of  patient  labor  was 
his  genius  ;  that  continuity  and  concentration  of  thought 
are  in  proportion  to  the  size  and  vitality  of  the  thinking 
principle.  Let  those  who  prate  about  indolent  genius 
conceive  of  the  energy  of  Scott.  At  the  age  of  fifty-six 
he  resolutely  braced  up  his'  energies  of  mind  to  pay  a 
debt  of  six  or  seven  hundred  thousand  dollars,  by  litera- 
ture. In  three  years  he  produced  thirty  volumes.  His 
frame  began  to  break  down.  Dr.  Abercrombie  implored 
him  to  desist  from  writing.  "  I  tell  you  what  it  is,  doc- 


GENIUS.  183 

tor,"  said  Scott,  "  when  Molly  puts  the  kettle  on,  you 
might  as  well  say,  don't  boil ! " 

This  living  energy  of  mind,  it  is  hard  to  kindle.  How 
many  go  down  to  the  grave  without  having  known,  dur- 
ing a  long  life,  what  thought  is  !  How  many  abide  in 
miserable  superstitions,  victims  of  every  quack  in  religion, 
politics  and  literature,  their  minds  mere  collections  of 
chips  and  hearsays,  feeling  their  degradation,  yet  prefer- 
ring it  to  the  labor  of  mental  effort !  This  slavery  of  the 
soul,  these  chains  clanking  upon  every  utterance  of  opin- 
ion, can  only  be  broken  by  the  strength  within  the  man. 
It  is  a  comparatively  easy  task  to  induce  men  to  sacrifice 
comfort  and  wealth,  to  be  fanatics,  and  very  brave  fanat- 
ics, for  any  cruel  nonsense  which  has  obtained  in  the 
world,  —  but  to  induce  them  to  think,  —  oh  !  that  is 
requiring  too  much  for  the  energies  of  mortal  man ! 
And  yet,  forsooth,  the  world  is  becoming  too  intellectual ! 
We  educate  the  intellect  too  much!  "My  friends,"  said 
Dr.  Johnson,  "  clear  your  minds  of  cant ! " 

Indeed,  education  can  hardly  be  too  intellectual,  unless 
by  intellectual  you  mean  parrot  knowledge,  and  other 
modes  of  mind-slaughter.  No  education  deserves  the 
name,  unless  it  develops  thought,  —  unless  it  pierces 
down  to  the  mysterious  spiritual  principle  of  mind,  and 
starts  that  into  activity  and  growth.  There,  all  educa- 
tion, intellectual,  moral,  religious,  begins ;  for  morality, 


184  GENITTS. 

religion,  intelligence,  have  all  one  foundation  in  vital 
thought ;  —  that  is,  in  thought  which  conceives  all  ob- 
jects with  which  it  deals,  whether  temporal  or  eternal, 
visible  or  invisible,  as  living  realities,  not  as  barren 
propositions.  Here  is  the  vital  principle  of  all  growth 
in  learning,  in  virtue,  in  intelligence,  in  holiness.  If  this 
fail,  there  is  no  hope  : 

"  The  pillared  firmament  is  rottenness, 
And  earth's  base  built  on  stubble." 

Thus  force  of  being,  to  labor,  to  create,  to  pluck  out 
the  heart  of  nature's  mystery, — this  is  the  law  of  genius. 
It  would  be  impossible  here  to  follow  this  live  and  life- 
giving  thought  of  man  in  its  invasion  of  the  possible  and 
the  unknown.  Its  result  is  human  knowledge,  —  the 
sciences  of  mind  and  matter,  poetry  and  the  plastic  arts, 
with  their  myriad  untraceable  influences  upon  society 
and  individual  character.  Genius,  mental  power,  wher- 
ever you  look,  you  see  the  radiant  footprints  of  its  victo- 
rious progress.  It  has  surrounded  your  homes  with  com- 
fort ;  it  has  given  you  the  command  of  the  blind  forces 
of  matter ;  it  has  exalted  and  consecrated  your  affections; 
it  has  brought  God's  immeasurable  universe  nearer  to 
your  hearts  and  imaginations ;  it  has  made  flowers  of 
paradise  spring  up  even  in  poor  men's  gardens.  And, 
above  all,  it  is  never  stationary ;  its  course  being  ever 
onward  to  new  triumphs,  its  repose  but  har.nonious  ac- 


GENIUS.  185 

tivity,  its  acquisitions  but  stimulants  to  discoveries. 
Answering  to  nothing  but  the  soul's  illimitable  energies, 
it  is  always  the  preacher  of  hope,  and  brave  endeavor, 
and  unwearied,  elastic  effort.  It  is  hard  to  rouse  in  their 
might  these  energies  of  thought;  but  when  once  roused, 
when  felt  tingling-  along  every  nerve  of  sensation,  the 
whjjle  inward  being  thrilling  with  their  enkindling  inspi- 
ration, 

"  And  all  the  God  comes  rushing  on  the  soul," 

there  seem  to  be  no  limits  to  their  capacity,  and  obsta- 
cles shrivel  into  ashes  in  their  fiery  path.  This  deep  feel- 
ing of  power  and  joy,  this  ecstasy  of  the  living  soul,  this 
untamed  and  untamable  energy  of  Genius,  —  you  can- 
not check  its  victorious  career  as  it  leaps  exultingly  from 
discovery  to  discovery,  new  truths  ever  beckoning  implor- 
ingly in  the  dim  distance,  a  universe  ever  opening  and 
expanding  before  it,  and  above  all  a  Voice  still  crying, 
On  J  on !  —  On !  though  the  clay  fall  from  the  soul's 
struggling  powers  !  —  On !  though  the  spirit  burn  through 
its  garment  of  flesh,  as  the  sun  through  mist !  —  On ! 
on! 

"  Alonij  the  line  of  limitless  desires." 


INTELLECTUAL  HEALTH  AND  DISEASE* 


A  PROMINENT  characteristic  of  the  present  day,  and  in 
many  respects  an  admirable  one,  is  the  universal  atten- 
tion given  to  the  subject  of  bodily  health ;  but,  like  many 
other  movements  founded  on  half-truths,  it  has  been 
pushed  by  fanaticism  into  ludicrous  perversions.  Physi- 
ology has  been  systematized  into  a  kind  of  popular  gos- 
pel, in  whose  doctrines  the  soul  seems  of  little  import- 
ance in  comparison  with  the  gastric  juice.  Physic  hav- 
ing become  a  fashion,  a  valetudinary  air  is  now  the  sign 
of  your  true  coxcomb ;  and  every  idle  person  has  his  pet 
complaint,  which  he  nurses  in  some  genteel  infirmary. 
There  is  an  universal  cant  about  health  ;  every  city  and 
hamlet  is  beleaguered  by  the  hosts  of  Hippocrates,  the 
floods  of  Hydropathy,  and  the  animalculae  of  Homeop- 
athy ;  and  no  person  can  venture  into  the  street  without 
being  assaulted  by  some  Hygeian  highwayman,  who 

*  Delivered  before  the  Literary  Societies  of  Dartmouth  College 
July  25,  1849. 


INTELLECTUAL    HEALTH    AND    DISEASE.  187 

presents  a  phial  to  his  head,  and  demands  his  patience 
or  his  purse.  Now,  the  practical  consequence  of  this 
deification  of  the  body  and  worship  of  dietetics,  is  to 
bring  men  under  the  dominion  of  a  sickly  selfishness  and 
a  craven  cowardice,  while  pretending  to  teach  them  the 
physical  laws  of  their  being.  Man  obeys  the  highest  law 
of  vhis  being  when  he  takes  his  life  in  his  hand,  and 
boldly  ventures  it  for  something  he  values  more  than 
self.  Life  cast  away  for  truth  or  duty,  even  for  fame  or 
knowledge,  is  better  than  life  saved  for  the  sake  of  living. 
But  your  true  disciple  of  physiological  religion,  with  his 
morbid  consciousness  of  that  collection  of  veins,  bones, 
muscles  and  appetites,  which  he  calls  himself,  would 
consider  it  a  monstrous  violation  of  the  physical  laws  of 
his  being  to  obey  a  benevolent  impulse  which  endangered 
a  blood-vessel,  or  to  purchase  the  discovery  of  a  new 
truth  at  the  expense  of  deranged  digestion :  and  he  would 
survey  with  lazy  wonder  the  strange  ignorance  of  How- 
ard, penetrating  into  pestilential  prisons ;  of  Washington, 
exposing  his  person  to  a  storm  of  bullets ;  of  Ridley, 
serenely  yielding  his  frame  to  that  baptism  of  fire  which 
enrolled  him  forever  in  the  glorious  army  of  martyrs. 
Such  acts  as  these  were  doubtless  violations  of  physical 
laws,  and  prove  that  heroes  are  not  framed  on  accurate 
physiological  principles. 

Indeed,  health  and  disease,  in  their  highest  meaning, 


188  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE. 

refer  more  to  the  mind  than  to  the  body.  A  code  of 
ethics  built  on  physical  laws  can  but  inculcate  a  selfish, 
superficial  prudence ;  and  prudence,  except  in  weaklings, 
will  not  restrain  self-indulgence,  and  ought  not  to  restrain 
self-sacrifice.  There  are  no  duties,  therefore,  which  are 
not  resolvable  into  moral  duties ;  no  vices  which  have 
not  their  scorpion  nest  in  the  heart.  Do  you  suppose 
that  any  knowing  prattle  about  the  breathing  or  digesting 
apparatus  will  still  the  hoarse  clamor  of  gluttony  and 
sensuality  ?  Will  it  relax  the  grasp  of  Satanic  pride  ?  In 
truth,  you  will  find  that  prudence  without  conscience 
holds  but  a  rein  of  flax  on  the  wild  war-horses  of  passion. 
But  it  is  a  characteristic  weakness  of  the  day  to  super- 
ficialize  evil ;  to  spread  a  little  cold  cream  over  Pande- 
monium, erect  a  nice  little  earthly  paradise  upon  it,  and 
then  to  rush  into  misanthropy  because  the  thin  structure 
instantly  melts.  Indeed,  it  is  at  the  very  core  of  the 
mind  that  we  must  search  for  the  principles  of  health  and 
disease,  —  in  the  mysteries  of  will,  intelligence,  senti- 
ment and  passion,  rather  than  in  the  organs  which  are 
their  instruments  or  victims.  Besides,  bodily  maladies 
may  be  badges  of  disgrace,  or  titles  of  honor;  your 
drunkard  and  your  philosopher  may  both  take  their  "  leap 
into  the  dark"  from  apoplexy ;  and  there  is  a  great  dif- 
ference between  Milton,  sacrificing  his  eyesight  from  the 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  189 

love  of  liberty,  and  Byron,  sacrificing  his  digestion  from 
the  love  of  gin. 

The  subject,  therefore,  to  which  1  would  call  your 
attention,  is  intellectual  health  and  disease,  as  it  exists  in 
individuals  and  in  nations.  To  one  who  reflects  on  the 
nature  and  capacity  of  the  human  mind,  there  is  some- 
thing inconceivably  awful  in  its  perversions.  Look  at  it 
as  incomes,  fresh  and  plastic,  from  its  Maker ;  look  at  it 
as  it  returns,  stained  and  hardened,  to  its  Maker.  Con- 
ceive of  a  mind,  a  living  soul,  with  the  germs  of  faculties 
which  infinity  cannot  exhaust,  as  it  first  beams  upon  you 
in  its  glad  morning  of  existence  ;  quivering  with  life  and 
joy;  exulting  in  the  bounding  sense  of  its  developing 
energies ;  beautiful,  and  brave,  and  generous,  and  joyous, 
and  free,  —  the  clear,  pure  spirit  bathed  in  the  auroral 
light  of  its  unconscious  immortality :  and  then  follow  it, 
in  its  dark  passage  through  life,  as  it  stifles  and  kills,  one 
by  one,  every  inspiration  and  aspiration  of  its  being,  until 
it  becomes  but  a  dead  soul  entombed  in  a  living  frame. 
It  may  be  that  a  selfish  frivolity  has  sunk  it  into  con- 
tented worldliness,  or  given  it  the  vapid  air  of  complacent 
imbecility.  It  may  be  that  it  is  marred  and  disfigured 
by  the  hoof-prints  of  appetite,  its  humanity  extinguished 
in  the  mad  tyranny  of  animal  ferocities.  It  may  be  that 
pride  has  stamped  the  scowl  of  hatred  upon  its  front ;  that 
avarice  and  revenge,  set  on  fire  of  hell,  have  blasted  and 


190  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE. 

blackened  its  unselfish  affections.  The  warm  sensibility 
gushing  spontaneously  out  in  world-wide  sympathies,  — 
the  bright  and  strong  intellect,  eager  for  action  and 
thirsting  for  truth,  —  the  rapturous  devotion,  mounting 
upwards  in  a  pillar  of  flame  to  God,  —  all  gone,  and 
only  remembered  as  childish  enthusiasm,  to  point  the 
sneer  of  the  shrewd,  and  the  scoff  of  the  brutal !  Where, 
in  this  hard  mass  of  animated  clay,  wrinkled  by  cunning 
or  brutalized  by  selfishness,  are  the  power  and  joy  proph- 
esied in  the  aspirations  of  youth  ? 

"  Whither  hath  fled  thg  visionary  gleam  1 
Where  is  it  now,  the  glory  and  the  dream  ?  " 

To  give  the  philosophy  of  this  mental  disease,  to  sub- 
ject the  mind  to  that  scrutiny  which  shall  account  for  its 
perversions,  we  must  pass  behind  its  ordinary  operations 
of  understanding,  sensibility  and  imagination,  and  attempt 
to  clutch  its  inmost  spirit  and  essence.  Now,  an  analysis 
of  our  consciousness,  or  rather  a  contemplation  of  the 
mysterious  processes  of  our  inward  life,  reveals  no  facul- 
ties and  no  impulses  which  can  be  disconnected  from 
our  personality.  The  mind  is  no  collection  of  self-acting 
powers  and  passions,  but  a  vital,  indissoluble  unit  and 
person,  capable,  it  is  true,  of  great  variety  of  manifesta- 
tion, but  still  in  its  nature  a  unit,  not  an  aggregate. 
For  the  purposes  of  science,  or  verbal  convenience, 
we  may  call  its  various  operations  by  different  names, 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH  AND   DISEASE.  19x 

according  as  it  perceives,  feels,  understands  or  imag- 
ines ;  but  the  moment  science  breaks  it  up  into  a 
series  of  disconnected  parts,  and  considers  each  part 
by  itself  as  a  separate  power,  that  moment  the  living 
principle  of  mind  is  lost,  and  the  result  is  an  anar- 
chy of  faculties.  Fortunately,  however,  we  cannot  free 
ourselves,  by  any  craft  of  analysis,  from  personal  pro- 
noftns.  A  man  who  speaks  or  acts,  instinctively  men- 
tions it  as  —  I  said,  I  did.  We  do  not  say  that  Milton's 
imagination  wrote  Paradise  Lost,  but  that  Milton  wrote 
it.  There  is  no  mental  operation  in  which  the  whole 
mind  is  not  present ;  nothing  produced  but  by  the  joint 
action  of  all  its  faculties,  under  the  direction  of  its  central 
personality.  This  central  principle  of  mind  is  spiritual 
force,  —  capacity  to  cause,  to  create,  to  assimilate,  to  be. 
This  underlies  all  faculties ;  interpenetrates,  fuses,  directs 
all  faculties.  This  thinks,  this  feels,  this  imagines,  this 
worships ;  this  is  what  glows  with  health,  this  is  what  is 
enfeebled  and  corrupted  by  disease.  Call  it  what  you 
please, — will,  personality,  individuality,  character,  force 
of  being;  but  recognize  it  as  the  true  spiritual  power 
which  constitutes  a  living  soul.  This  is  the  only  pecu- 
liarity which  separates  the  impersonal  existence  of  a 
vegetable  from  the  personal  life  of  a  man.  The  material 
universe  is  instinct  with  spiritual  existence,  but  only  in 
man  is  il  individualized  into  spiritual  life. 


192  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE. 

Now,  there  is  no  such  thing  as  faculty  which  has  not 
its  root  in  this  personal  force.  Without  this,  thought  is 
but  insanity,  and  action,  fate.  Men  do  not  stumble,  and 
blunder,  and  happen  into  Iliads,  and  JEneids,  and  Divina 
Commedias,  and  Othellos,  in  a  drunken  dream  of  poetic 
inspiration,  but  work  and  grow  up  to  them.  It  is  com- 
mon, I  know,  to  point  to  some  lazy  gentleman,  and  say 
that  there  is  a  protuberance  on  his  forehead  or  temple 
sufficiently  large  to  produce  a  Hamlet  or  a  Principia,  if 
he  only  had  an  active  temperament.  But  the  thing 
which  produces  Hamlets  and  Principias  is  not  physical 
temperament,  but  spiritual  power.  What  a  man  does 
is  the  real  test  of  what  a  man  is ;  and  to  declare  that 
he  has  great  capacity  but  nothing  great  to  set  his 
capacity  in  motion,  is  an  absurdity  in  terms. 

This  mind,  this  free  spiritual  force,  cannot  grow, 
cannot  even  exist,  by  itself.  It  can  only  grow  by  assim- 
ilating something  external  to  itself,  the  very  condition  of 
mental  life  being  the  exercise  of  power  within  on  objects 
without.  The  form  and  superficial  qualities  of  objects  it 
perceives ;  their  life  and  spirit  it  conceives.  Only  what 
the  mind  conceives,  it  assimilates  and  draws  into  its  own 
life  ;  —  intellectual  conception  indicating  a  penetrating 
vision  into  the  heart  of  things,  through  a  fierce,  firm 
exertion  of  vital  creative  force.  In  this  distinction 
between  perception  and  conception,  we  have  a  principle 


INTELLECTUAL    HEALTH    AND    DISEASE.  193 

which  accounts  for  the  limited  degree  in  which  so  many 
persons  grow  in  intelligence  and  character,  in  grace  and 
gracelessness.  Here,  also,  is  the  distinction  between 
assent  and  faith,  theory  and  practice.  In  the  one  case, 
opinions  lie  on  the  surface  of  the  mind,  mere  objects,  the 
truth  of  which  it  perceives,  but  which  do  not  influence 
its  will ;  in  the  other,  ideas  penetrate  into  the  very  sub- 
stance of  the  mind,  become  one  with  it,  and  are  springs 
of  living  thought  and  action.  For  instance,  you  may 
cram  whole  folios  of  morality  and  divinity  into  the 
heads  of  Dick  Turpin  and  Captain  Kidd,  and  both  will 
cordially  assent  to  their  truth  ;  but  the  captives  of  Dick's 
blunderbuss  will  still  have  to  give  up  their  purses,  and 
the  prisoners  of  Kidd's  piracy  will  still  have  to  walk  the 
plank.  On  the  other  hand,  you  may  pour  all  varieties 
of  immoral  opinions  and  images  into  the  understanding 
of  a  pure  and  high  nature,  and  there  they  will  remain, 
unassimilated,  uncorrupting ;  his  mind,  like  that  of  Ion, 

"  Though  shapes  of  ill 
May  hover  round  its  surface,  glides  in  light, 
And  takes  no  shadow  from  them." 

In  accordance  with  the  same  principle,  all  knowledge, 
however  imposing  in  its  appearance,  is  but  superficial 
knowledge,  if  it  be  merely  the  mind's  furniture,  not  the 
mind's  nutriment.  It  must  be  transmuted  into  mind,  as 
food  is  into  blood,  to  become  wisdom  and  power.  There 
13 


194  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH    AND   DISEASE. 

is  many  a  human  parrot  and  memory-monger,  who 
has  read  and  who  recollects  more  history  than  Webster ; 
but  in  Webster,  history  has  become  judgment,  foresight, 
executive  force,  mind.  That  seemingly  instinctive  sa- 
gacity, by  which  an  able  man  does  exactly  the  right  thing 
at  the  right  moment,  is  nothing  but  a  collection  of  facts 
thus  assimilated  into  thought.  This  power  of  instanta- 
neous action  without  reflection  is  the  only  thing  which 
saves  men  in  great  emergencies ;  but  far  from  being  inde- 
pendent of  knowledge  and  experience,  it  is  their  noblest 
result.  Many  of  the  generals  opposed  to  Napoleon 
understood  military  science  as  well  as  he  did ;  but  he 
beat  them  on  every  occasion  where  victory  depended  on 
a  wise  movement  made  at  a  moment's  thought,  because 
science  had  been  transfused  into  his  mind,  while  it  was 
only  attached  to  theirs.  Every  truly  practical  man, 
whether  he  be  merchant,  mechanic,  or  agriculturalist, 
thus  transmutes  his  experience  into  intelligence,  until  his 
will  operates  with  the  celerity  of  instinct.  In  the  order 
of  intellectual  development,  intuition  does  not  precede 
observation  and  reflection,  but  is  their  last  perfection. 
First,  slow  steps,  cautious  examination,  comparison,  rea- 
soning ;  then,  thought  and  action,  swift,  sharp  and  sure, 
as  the  lightning. 

If   the    mind  thus   grows  by  assimilating  external 
objects,  it  is  plain  that  the  character  of  the  objects  it 


INTELLECTUAL    HEALTH    AND   DISEASE.  195 

assimilates  will  determine  the  form  of  its  development, 
and  its  health  or  disease.  Mental  health  consists  in  the 
self-direction  of  mental  power,  in  the  capacity  to  perceive 
its  own  relations  to  objects  and  the  relations  of  objects  to 
each  other,  and  to  choose  those  which  will  conduce  to  its 
enlargement  and  elevation.  Disease  occurs  both  when  it 
loses  its  self-direction,  and  its  self-distrust.  When  it  loses 
its  self-direction,  it  surrenders  itself  to  every  outward 
impression ;  when  it  loses  its  self-distrust,  it  surrenders 
itself  to  every  inward  whim.  In  the  one  case,  it  loses  all 
moral  and  intellectual  character,  becomes  unstrung,  sen- 
timental, dissolute,  with  feebleness  at  the  very  heart  of 
its  being ;  in  the  other,  it  perversely  misconceives  and 
discolors  external  things,  views  every  object  as  a  mirror 
of  self,  and,  having  no  reverence  for  aught  above  itself, 
subsides  into  a  poisonous  mass  of  egotism,  conceit,  and 
falsehood.  Thus  disease  occurs  both  when  the  mind  loses 
itself  in  objects,  and  when  objects  are  lost  in  it,  —  when 
it  parts  with  will,  and  when  it  becomes  wilful.  The  last 
consequence  of  will  submerged  is  sensuality,  brutality, 
slavishness ;  the  last  consequence  of  will  perverted  is 
Satanic  pride.  Now,  it  is  an  almost  universal  law,  that 
the  diseased  weak,  the  men  of  unrestrained  appetites, 
shall  become  the  victims  and  slaves  of  the  diseased  strong, 
the  men  of  unrestrained  wills,  and  that  the  result  of  this 
relation  shall  be  misery,  decay  and  death,  to  both.  Here 


196  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH    AND  DISEASE. 

is  Ae  principle  of  all  slavery,  political,  intellectual,  and 
religious,  in  individuals  and  in  communities. 

Thus  if  the  primitive  principle  of  mind  be  simply  the 
capacity  to  assimilate  external  objects,  and  if  objects  in 
this  process  become  mind  and  character,  it  is  obvious 
that  self-direction,  —  the  power  to  choose,  to  resist,  to  act 
in  reference  to  law,  and  not  from  the  impulse  of  desire,  — 
is  the  condition  of  health  and  enduring  strength.  Let 
us  now  consider  how  these  objects,  —  which  may  be 
included  under  the  general  terms  of  nature  and  other 
minds,  —  influence  for  evil  or  good  the  individual  soul, 
according  as  their  impulse  is  blindly  followed,  wilfully 
perverted,  or  genially  assimilated. 

The  objects  which  have  the  most  power  over  the  mind 
are  probably  those  in  visible  nature  which  refer  to  appe- 
tite and  passion.  These  are  continually  striving  to  draw 
the  mind  into  themselves,  to  weaken  the  force  at  its  cen- 
tre and  soul,  to  reduce  it  into  mere  perception  and  sen- 
sation, and  to  destroy  its  individual  life.  The  emotion 
which  accompanies  this  yielding  of  the  mind  to  death 
has,  with  a  bitterness  of  irony  never  excelled  by  man  or 
demon,  been  called  pleasure.  Now,  it  is  a  mistake  which 
is  apt  to  vitiate  theology,  to  confound  will  with  wilful- 
ness,  and  to  make  destruction  of  will  the  condition  of 
rising  to  God.  But  will  weakened,  or  will  destroyed, 
ever  goes  downwards.  It  delivers  itself  to  sensuality, — 01 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  197 

to  fanaticism,  which  is  the  sensuality  of  the  religious 
sentiment,  —  not  to  spirituality,  not  to  Deity.  A  being 
placed  like  man  among  strong  and  captivating  visible 
objects,  becomes,  the  moment  he  loses  self-direction,  a 
slave,  in  the  most  terribly  comprehensive  meaning  of 
that  all-annihilating  word ;  and  I  believe  the  doctrine 
rftns  not  that  we  are  slaves,  but  children  of  God. 

Will  is  also  often  confounded  with  wilfulness  in  the 
metaphysics  of  that  aesthetic  criticism  which  deals  with 
the  grandest  creations  of  genius.  The  highest  mood  of 
the  mind  is  declared  to  be  that  where  it  loses  its  individ- 
uality in  the  objects  it  contemplates ;  where  it  becomes 
objective  and  healthy,  in  distinction  from  subjective  or 
morbid.  This  objectiveness  is  confounded  with  self- 
abandonment,  and  thus  causative  force  is  absurdly  denied 
while  treating  of  the  soul's  creative  acts.  But  it  is  not 
by  self-abandonment  that  the  far-darting,  all-assimilating 
intellect  of  Genius  identifies  itself  for  the  moment  with 
its  conceptions ;  it  is  rather  by  the  sublimest  exercise 
of  will  and  central  force.  Let  us  take,  in  illustration, 
three  poets,  in  an  ascending  scale  of  intellectual  prece- 
dence ;  —  Keats,  the  representative  of  sensitiveness ;  By- 
ron, of  wilfulness ;  Shakspeare,  of  self-direction.  Now, 
in  Keats,  —  a  mind  of  immense  spontaneous  fruitfulness, 
—  a  certain  class  of  objects  take  his  intellect  captive, 
melt  and  merge  his  individual  being  in  themselves,  are 


193  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH    AND   DISEASE. 

stronger  than  he,  and  hold  him  in  a  state  of  soft  diffu- 
sion in  their  own  nature.  The  impression  left  on  the 
imagination  is  of  sensuous  beauty,  but  spiritual  weak- 
ness. Then  Byron,  arrogant,  domineering,  egotistic, 
diseased, — viewing  nature  and  man  altogether  in  rektion 
to  himself,  and  spurning  the  objective  laws  of  things,  — 
forces  objects,  with  autocratic  insolence,  into  the  shape 
of  his  own  morbid  nature,  stamps  them  with  his  mark, 
and  leaves  the  impression  of  intense,  narrow,  wilful 
energy.  But  Shakspeare,  the  strongest  of  creative  intel- 
lects, and  comprehensive  because  he  was  strong,  passes, 
by  the  gigantic  force  of  his  will,  into  the  heart  of  other 
natures ;  is  sensuous,  impassioned,  witty,  beautiful,  sub- 
lime, and  terrible,  at  pleasure ;  rises  by  the  same  force 
with  which  he  stoops ;  in  his  most  prodigious  exertions 
of  energy  ever  observes  laws  instead  of  obeying  caprice  ; 
comprehends  all  his  creations  without  being  compre- 
hended by  them ;  and  comes  out  at  the  end,  not  Fal- 
staff,  or  Faulconbridge,  or  Hamlet,  or  Timon,  or  Lear, 
or  Perdita,  but  Shakspeare,  the  beneficent  and  august 
intellect  which  includes  them  all.  The  difference  be- 
tween him  and  other  poets  is,  that,  in  virtue  of  passing 
into  another  life  by  force  of  will,  not  by  being  drawn  in 
by  force  of  the  object,  he  could  escape  from  it  with  ease, 
and  proceed  to  animate  other  existences,  thus  keeping 
his  mind  constantly  assimilating  and  working  with 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  199 

nature.  Keats  was  drawn  into  his  particular  class  of 
objects,  and  could  not  get  out.  Byron  drew  objects  into 
himself,  and  then  poisoned  them  by  capriciously  distort- 
ing and  discoloring  their  essential  character.  Keats 
would  have  stayed  with  Perdita ;  Byron,  with  Timon. 

Let  us  next  consider,  in  further  illustration  of  our 
4lT"eme,  those  potent  forces  which  come,  through  history, 
through  literature,  and  through  social  communion,  from 
other  minds,  and  from  whose  action  a  continual  stream 
of  influences  is  pouring  in  upon  the  individual  soul. 
Those  which  proceed  from  society,  to  benefit  or  corrupt, 
are  so  obvious  that  it  is  needless  to  emphasize  their 
power.  Look  around  any  community,  and  you  find  it 
dotted  over  with  men,  marked  and  ticketed  as  not  belong- 
ing to  themselves,  but  to  some  other  man,  from  whom 
they  take  their  literature,  their  politics,  -their  religion. 
They  are  willing  captives  of  a  stronger  nature  ;  feed  on 
his  life  as  though  it  were  miraculous  manna  rained  from 
heaven  ;  complacently  parade  his  name  as  an  adjective 
to  point  out  their  own ;  and  give  wonderful  pertinence 
to  that  nursery  rhyme,  whose  esoteric  depth  irradiates 
even  its  exoteric  expression :  — 

"  Whose  dog  are  you  ? 

I  am  Billy  Patton's  dog, 

Whose  dog  are  you  ?  " 

This  social  servility,  as  seen  in  its  annual  harvest  of 


200  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE. 

dwindled  souls,  abject  in  everything,  from  the  tie  of  a 
neckcloth  to  the  points  of  a  creed,  is  a  sufficiently  strong 
indication  of  the  tyranny  which  a  few  forcible  persons 
can  establish  in  any  of  our  "  free  and  enlightened  "  com- 
munities ;  but  perhaps  a  more  subtle  influence  than  that 
which  proceeds  from  social  relations,  comes  from  that 
abstract  and  epitome  of  the  whole  mind  of  the  whole 
world,  which  we  find  in  history  and  literature.  Here  the 
thought  and  action  of  the  race  are  brought  home  to  the 
individual  intelligence  ;  and  the  danger  is,  that  we  make 
what  should  be  our  emancipation  an  instrument  of  servi- 
tude, fall  a  victim  to  one  author  or  one  age,  and  lose  the 
power  of  learning  from  many  minds,  by  sinking  into  the 
contented  vassal  of  one ;  and  end,  at  last,  in  an  intellectual 
resemblance  to  that  gentleman  who  only  knew  two  tunes, 
"  one  of  which,"  he  said,  "  was  Old  Hundred,  and  the 
other — was  n't."  The  danger  to  individuality,  in  reading , 
is  not  that  we  repeat  an  author's  opinions  or  expressions 
but  that  we  be  magnetized  by  his  spirit  to  the  extent  of 
being  drawn  into  his  stronger  life,  and  losing  our  partic- 
ular being.  Now,  no  man  is  benefited  by  being  con- 
quered; and  the  most  modest  might  say  to  the  mightiest, 
—  to  Homer,  to  Dante,  to  Milton,  to  Goethe,  —  "  Keep 
off,  gentlemen,  —  not  so  near,  if  you  please;  you  can  do 
me  vast  service,  provided  you  do  not  swallow  me  up ;  my 
personal  being  is  small,  but  allow  me  to  say  of  it,  as 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  201 

Touchstone  said  of  Audrey,  his  wife,  '  A  poor  thing,  sir, 
but  mine  own.' " 

Indeed,  we  can  never  fully  realize  and  reverence  a 
great  nature,  never  grow  through  a  reception  of  his  spirit, 
unless  we  keep  our  individuality  distinct  from  his.  In 
the  case  of  a  large  and  diseased  mind,  the  caution  be- 
comes more  important.  The  most  popular  poet  of  the 
present  century  is  so  in  consequence  of  the  weakness  of 
his  readers,  who  are  not  so  much  his  pupils  as  his  slaves. 
Byron,  in  virtue  of  his  superior  force,  breaks  into  their 
natures,  so  to  speak,  —  passes  into  the  very  core  of  their 
moral  and  intellectual  being,  —  makes  them  live,  in 
thought,  his  life,  —  Byronizes  them:  and  the  result  of 
the  conquest  is  a  horde  of  minor  Byrons,  with  their  thir? 
dilutions  of  misanthropy  and  licentiousness,  not  half  so 
good  as  the  original  Peter  and  John  they  have  delivered 
up.  "  It  was  nae  great  head  in  itsell,"  said  the  old 
Scotchwoman,  as  that  of  Duke  Hamilton  rolled  from  the 
block,  "  but  it  was  a  sair  loss  to  him."  —  In  view  of  the 
enfeebling  and  corrupting  influence  exercised  by  a  mor- 
bid  nature,  one  is  reminded  of  the  anecdote  told  of  White- 
field,  the  preacher.  A  drunkard  once  reeled  up  to  him, 
with  the  remark,  —  "Mr.  Whitefield,  I  am  one  of  your 
converts."  —  "I  think  it  very  likely,"  was  the  reply,  "  for 
I  am  sure  you  are  none  of  God's." 

The  truth  probably  is,  that  the  fallacies  on  this  subject 


202  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND    DISEASE. 

cf  will  and  personality,  in  matters  pertaining  both  to 
intellect  and  morals,  have  their  source  in  man's  hatred  to 
work,  to  the  independent  exercise  of  power ;  accordingly 
he  tries,  cunningly  enough,  to  ignore  the  fact  that  work 
is  the  law  by  which  the  mind  grows,  and  affects  reverie, 
the  opium-eating  of  the  intellect,  and  calls  it  thinking. 
Theology  and  philosophy  are  both  apt  to  be  pervaded  by 
a  kind  of  pantheism,  in  which  the  perfection  of  our  nature 
is  represented  to  consist  in  merging  the  soul  in  universal 
being,  and  its  heaven  a  state  where  it  loses  itself  in  a  sea 
of  delicious  sensations.  It  is  needless  to  add  that  many 
realize  a  tolerable  heaven  of  their  kind — on  earth. 

Passing  from  the  individual  to  the  community,  let  us 
now  survey  the  two  forms  of  mental  disease,  self-worship 
and  self-abandonment,  as  expressed  in  the  history  of 
states.  A  nation  is  no  more  a  mere  collection  of  indi- 
viduals, than  an  individual  is  a  mere  collection  of  facul- 
ties. It  has  a  national  life,  more  or  less  peculiar  in  its 
features,  and  subject  to  disease  and  decay ;  and  of  this 
national  life  its  form  of  civilization  is  the  embodiment. 
Now,  in  the  earlier  ages  of  the  world,  in  the  childhood  of 
humanity,  the  characteristic  form  of  mental  disease  is 
feebleness  of  personal  faing,  and  the  consequent  absorp- 
tion of  the  individual  in  surrounding  objects.  He  deifies 
and  worships  every  form  and  expression  of  external 
power,  perceiving  a  god,  audible  or  visible,  in  every  out- 


INTELLECTUAL    HEALTH    AND    DISEASE.  203 

ward  force.  He  is,  of  course,  the  natural  prey  of  craft, 
ferocity,  and  tyranny,  and  his  weakness  is  perverted  into 
a  besotted  superstition,  and  a  worship  even  of  beasts  and 
inanimate  idols.  Such  were  the  myriads  of  that  dark 
Egypt,  which  looms  so  gloomily  up  above  the  clouds  of 
oblivion,  the  very  image  of  disease  and  death.  The 
•  civilization  of  India  had  the  same  inherent  weakness  ;  — 
the  popular  mythology,  a  medley  of  picturesque  brutali- 
ties ;  the  learned  philosophy,  a  dreamy  pantheism,  wast- 
ing ».nd  withering  the  primitive  springs  of  action,  its  first 
principle  the  immersion  of  the  individual  soul  in  the  Infi- 
nite. India  fell  by  a  law  as  certain  as  gravitation  before 
the  fe  ocity  of  Mahometan  conquest,  and  the  Mahometan 
conquerors  as  certainly  before  the  energy  of  England. 

The  civilization  of  the  Asiatics,  indeed,  was  a  sys- 
tematizv.d  anarchy  of  wretchedness  and  rapine,  —  a 
monstrous  agglomeration,  representing  a  despot,  a  priest- 
hood, and  t  huddled  mass  of  human  creatures  with  slave 
written  upon  and  burnt  into  their  inmost  being.  The 
vices  of  the  tyrant  are  caprice,  self-exaggeration,  defiance 
of  restraint;  the  vices  of  the  slave  are  falsehood,  pol- 
troonery, and  sensuality  :  and  a  national  life  composed  of 
such  elements,  demoniacal  vices  on  the  one  hand,  and 
abject  vices  on  the  other,  must  sink  'mto  imbecility,  and 
totter  to  the  tomb. 

In  passing  from  the  simple  forms  of  Asiatic  life  to  the 


204  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE. 

complex  civilization  of  Greece,  a  more  difficult  problem 
presents  itself.  The  Greek  Mind,  with  its  combination 
of  energy  and  objectiveness,  its  open  sense  to  all  the 
influences  of  nature,  its  wonderful  adaptation  to  philoso- 
phy, and  art,  and  arms,  —  where,  it  may  be  asked,  can 
you  detect  disease  in  that  ?  The  answer  to  this  ques- 
tion is  fortunately  partly  contained  in  the  statement  of  a 
fact.  Greek  civilization  is  dead ;  the  Greek  mind  died 
out  more  than  two  thousand  years  ago ;  a  race  of  heroes 
declined  into  a  race  of  sycophants,  sophists,  and  slaves ; 
and  no  galvanic  action  of  modern  sympathy  has  ever  yet 
convulsed  it  into  even  a  resemblance  of  its  old  life.  Now, 
if  it  died,  it  must  have  died  of  disease ;  for  nothing  else 
has  power  to  kill  a  nation.  In  considering  the  causes  of 
the  decay  of  a  national  mind  so  orderly,  comprehensive 
and  creative  as  the  Greek,  we  must  keep  steadily 
prominent  the  fact  that  it  began  in  Satanic  energy, 
and  that  it  is  an  universal  law  that  this  energy  in  the 
end  consumes  itself.  Perhaps  the  history  of  the  Greek 
Mind  is  best  read  in  the  characteristics  of  its  three 
great  dramatists,  —  sublime  and  wilful  in  jEschylus, 
beautiful  in  Sophocles,  sentimental  in  Euripides.  The 
Greek  deified  Man,  first  as  an  object  of  religion,  then  as 
an  object  of  art.  Now,  as  it  is  a  consequence  of  high 
culture,  that  a  superstition,  having  its  source  in  human 
passions,  shall  subside  from  a  religion  into  an  art,  the 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  205 

Greek  became  atheistical  as  he  grew  intelligent.  He 
had,  so  to  speak,  a  taste  for  divinities,  but  no  belief  in 
them.  He  acknowledged  nothing  higher  than  his  own 
mind ;  waxed  measurelessly  proud  and  conceited ;  wor- 
shipped, in  fact,  himself.  He  had  opinions  on  morals, 
but  he  assimilated  no  moral  ideas.  Now,  the  moment  he 

became  an  atheist,  the  moment  he  ceased  to  rise  above 

f 
himself,  he  began  to  decay.     The  strength  at  the  heart 

of  a  nation,  which  keeps  it  alive,  must  either  grow  or 
dwindle  ;  and,  after  a  certain  stage  in  its  progress,  it  can 
only  grow  by  assimilating  moral  and  religious  truth. 
Moral  corruption,  which  is  the  result  of  wilful  energy, 
eats  into  the  very  substance  and  core  of  intellectual  life. 
Energy,  it  is  true,  is  requisite  to  all  greatness  of  soul ;  but 
the  energy  of  health,  while  it  has  the  strength  and  fear- 
lessness of  Prometheus  chained  to  the  rock,  or  Satan 
buffeting  the  billows  of  fire,  is  also  meek,  aspiring  and 
reverential.  Its  spirit  is  that  of  the  stout  old  martyr,  who 
told  the  trembling  brethren  of  the  faith  who  clustered 
around  his  funeral  pyre,  that  if  his  soul  was  serene  in  its 
last  struggle  with  death,  he  would  lift  up  his  hands  to 
them  as  a  sign.  They  watched,  with  tremulous  eager- 
ness, the  fierce  element,  as  it  swept  along  and  over  his 
withered  frame,  and,  in  the  awful  agonies  of  that  moment 
when  he  was  encircled  with  fire,  and  wholly  hidden  from 


206  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE. 

their  view,  two  thin  hands  quivered  up  above  fagot  and 
flame,  and  closed  in  the  form  of  prayer. 

In  the  Greek  mind,  the  wilful  element  took  the  form 
of  conceit  rather  than  pride,  and  it  is  therefore  in  the 
civilization  of  Rome  that  we  must  seek  for  the  best 
expression  of  the  power  and  tne  weakness  of  Satanic 
passion.  The  myth,  which  declares  its  founders  to  have 
been  suckled  by  a  wolf,  aptly  symbolizes  that  base  of 
ferocity  and  iron  will  on  which  its  colossal  dominion  was 
raised.  The  Roman  mind,  if  we  look  at  it  in  relation  to 
its  all-conquering1  courage  and  intelligence,  had  many 
sublime  qualities ;  but  pride,  hard,  fierce,  remorseless, 
invulnerable  pride  and  contempt  of  right,  was  its  ruling 
characteristic.  It  existed  just  as  long  as  it  had  power  to 
crush  opposition.  But  avarice,  licentiousness,  effemi- 
nacy, the  whole  brood  of  the  abject  vices,  are  sure  at 
last  to  fasten  on  the  conqueror,  humbling  his  proud  will, 
and  turning  his  strength  into  weakness.  The  heart  of 
that  vast  empire  was  ulcerated  long  before  it  fell.  The 
sensuality  of  a  Mark  Antony  is  a  more  frightful  thing 
than  the  sensuality  of  a  savage ;  and  when  self-abandon- 
ment thus  succeeds  to  self-worship,  and  men  are  literally 
riven  over  to  their  lusts,  a  state  of  society  exists  which, 
in  its  demoniacal  contempt  of  restraint,  sets  all  descrip- 
tion at  defiance.  The  irruption  of  barbarian  energy  into 
that  worn-out  empire,  —  the  fierce  horde  of  savages 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  20"* 

that  swept  in  a  devouring  flame  over  its  plains  and 
cities,  —  we  view  with  something  of  the  grim  satisfaction 
with  which  an  old  Hebrew  might  have  surveyed  the 
engulfing  of  Pharaoh  and  his  host  in  the  waters  of  the 
Red  Sea. 

In  the  dark  ages  which  succeeded  the  overthrow  of  the 
^Roman  empire,  modern  civilization  had  its  birth;  and 
with  those  ages  it  is  still  connected  by  an  organic  bond. 
This  civilization  is  the  most  complex  that  ever  existed. 
If  we  pass  back  to  its  youth,  we  find  in  it  two  grand 
leading  principles  of  order  and  disorder,  of  health  and 
disease,  whose  contact,  collision  and  union,  almost  con- 
stitute its  history.  These  are,  the  Feudal  System  and 
the  Christian  Church.  Now,  feudalism  is  the  embodi- 
ment of  Satanic  pride.  Its  will  is  its  law.  It  does 
everything  it  has  power  to  do,  without  regard  lo  the 
judgment  of  heaven  or  earth.  It  plants  its  iron  heel  firm 
upon  the  weak,  and  lifts  its  iron  front  firm  upon  the 
strong,  and  says,  in  its  pitiless  valor,  — "  What  I  obtained 
by  force  take  by  force,  if  you  can."  I  speak  not  of  the 
feudalism  of  romance,  but  of  history  ;  not  as  we  find  it  in 
Miss  Porter's  novels,  but  as  we  find  it  in  the  pages  of 
Proissart  and  Monstrelet,  of  Michelet  and  Thierry. 
Feudalism,  as  a  fact,  was  a  cruel  and  remorseless  oligar- 
chy, in  which  a  horde  of  independent  barons,  acknowl- 
edging allegiance  to  a  central  power  in  the  state,  but 


208  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND    DISEASE. 

nullifying  the  decisions  of  that  power  at  their  own  pleas- 
ure, wielded  a  merciless  dominion  over  a  nation  of  serfs. 
Now,  this  relation  of  master  and  slave,  this  division  of 
tyranny  into  many  parts,  and  making  each  man  a  tyrant 
in  his  own  domain,  is  the  devil's  own  contrivance  for 
ruining  both  the  oppressor  and  the  oppressed.  It  cor- 
rupts, corrodes,  and  consumes  the  inmost  principle  of 
national  life.  Accordingly,  the  chronicles  of  the  middle 
ages  teem  with  crimes,  which  almost  realize  a  good- 
natured  man's  idea  of  the  bottomless  pit.  Hatred,  rapine, 
revenge,  lust,  blasphemy,  —  all  those  ferocious  and  suici- 
dal vices  which  slowly  consume  the  vigor  whence  they 
spring,  —  rage  and  revel  there,  with  that  peculiar  demo- 
niacal scorn  of  restraint,  which  characterizes  the  brutali- 
ties of  a  spiritual  being.  The  popular  insurrections  of  the 
period  reveal,  as  by  a  flash  of  lightning,  the  condition  of 
that  vaunted  society  where  capital  owns  labor.  For  a 
moment  you  see  the  serf  burst  his  bonds,  pass  from  the 
brute  into  the  maniac,  and  rush  into  the  insanest  excesses 
of  licentiousness  ;  and  then  comes  the  mailed  baron,  cool, 
collected,  ruthless  in  his  ferocity,  trampling  him  down 
again  with  the  diabolical  malignity  of  inhuman  strength. 
But  hatred  indulged  to  inferiors  eventually  generates 
hatred  to  equals,  and  poisons  at  last  the  domestic  rela- 
tion itself.  The  unnatural  crimes  which  blacken  the 
annals  of  so  many  families,  ironically  styled  noble, — 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  209 

father  arrayed  against  son,  brother  against  brother,  and 
murder  staining  the  very  hearth-stones  of  the  baronial 
castle,  —  are  but  the  final  results  of  pampered  self-will 
conducting  us  into  the  black  depths  of  minds,  in  whom 
hatred  and  moody  pride  have  extinguished  the  last 
instinct  to  which  reverence  can  cling. 

Still,  you  may  contend,  in  these  old  barons  there 
dwelt  a  tremendous  force.  True  :  but  was  it  durable  ? 
Who  are  their  descendants  ?  Mere  weaklings  in  com- 
parison with  the  descendants  of  their  former  serfs. 
Where  is  their  system  ?  Why,  its  fossil  remains  blew 
up  not  eighteen  months  ago,  and  a  wondering  people, 
who  had  long  been  scared  by  its  frowning  looks,  found  it 
to  be  a  mere  miserable  shell  and  sham,  its  life  and  sub- 
stance all  eaten  away,  —  "  self-fed  and  self-consumed." 

But  side  by  side  with  this  Feudalism  was  established 
the  Christian  Church.  Thus  Pandemonium  and  Heaven 
were  both,  so  to  speak,  organized  on  earth ;  acted  and 
reacted  on  each  other,  and  passed  into  each  other's  life. 
The  consequence  of  this  mixture  of  principles  was,  that 
the  church  was  corrupted,  and  feudalism  improved,  even- 
tually to  be  destroyed.  There  was  at  least  the  recognition 
of  something  higher  than  man,  something  which  the 
soul  might  reverence.  This  was  the  salvation  of  modem 
society,  as  it,  continually  poured  into  veins,  shrunken  and 
withered  by  moral  evil,  some  rills  of  moral  life.  The 
14 


210  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND    DISEASE. 

leading  characteristic,  however,  of  religion,  at  the  period 
of  which  we  are  speaking,  consisted  in  its  being  an 
opinion  or  a  fanaticism.  The  feudal  baron  would  have 
been  shocked  had  you  called  him  an  atheist,  even  while 
performing  acts  and  pampering  passions  which  are  the 
essence  of  atheism,  for  he  held  to  Christianity  as  an 
opinion ;  and  when  some  overpowering  calamity  broke 
down  his  stubborn  will,  and  Remorse  fixed  its  fangs  upon 
his  heart,  he  was  as  liable  as  the  most  slavish  of  his  serfs 
to  be  swept  away  in  a  torrent  of  fanaticism.  But  this 
fanaticism,  though  itself  a  disease,  and  representing  a 
will  in  ruins  rather  than  a  character  built  up,  is  still  a 
reaction  against  pride,  and  limits  the  ravages  of  moral 
evil,  as  physical  suffering  limits  unbridled  appetites. 

Now,  if  we  examine  modern  history  with  a  view  to 
observe  the  working  of  the  religious  element  in  its  events, 
—  watching  this  element  as  it  mingles  with  the  harsher 
qualities  of  that  mass  of  humanity  of  whose  life  it  forms 
apart,  —  we  cannot -fail  to  notice  its  agency  in  every 
great  social  convulsion  which  has  saved  modern  civiliza 
tion  from  the  death  of  the  ancient,  and  saved  it  by 
toppling  down  the  institutions  in  which  its  social  disease 
had  come  to  a  head.  But  we  shall  also  see  that  each 
reform  and  revolution  has  partaken  of  the  corruption  of 
the  community  in  which  it  originated ;  has  been  but  an 
inadequate  expression  of  moral  force ;  and  has  exhibited 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  211 

unmistakable  signs  of  the  Satanic  element  blended  with 
its  beneficent  purpose.  In  short,  modern  civilization,  in 
regard  to  its  life,  is  a  corrupted  Christianity.  It  has 
opinions  more  or  less  true,  but  it  has  imperfectly  assimi- 
lated truth.  It  assents  to  perfect  doctrines,  but  it  lives  a 
kind  of  Christian  diabolism.  Consequently,  all  the  great 
movements  of  the  European  mind  have  been  but  fits 
of  splendid  fanaticism,  followed  by  reactions  towards 
apathy ;  and  have  indicated  little  more  than  the  desperate 
moral  disease  they  partially  eradicated.  The  Crusades, 
the  Reformation,  the  English  Revolutions  of  1640  and 
1688,  the  French  Revolutions  of  1789  and  1848,  all 
prove  that  a  community  cannot  lift  itself  by  a  convulsive 
throe  above  the  high  water  mark  of  its  practical  life.  Its 
contortions  are  signs  of  vitality,  but  of  vitality  struggling 
with  death.  There  has  been  progress  in  European 
society,  if  we  reckon  it  not  by  years  but  centuries ;  but  it 
has  been  a  progress  marked  by  jerks  rather  than  by  steps. 
It  has  not  yet  arrived  at  that  degree  of  spiritual  force, 
that  momentum  of  moral  energy,  which  is  the  condition 
of  healthy  motion,  —  of  steady,  temperate,  determined, 
onward,  ever  onward  movement.  At  the  present  time  it 
presents  no  spectacle  of  order,  but  rather  of  disorder  after 
stagnation.  Peace  it  does  not  deserve,  and  peace  it  will 
not  obtain.  Repose  is  harmonious  activity,  the  top  and 
crown  of  the  highest  force,  leaning  for  support  on  eternal 


212  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND    DISEASE. 

laws  ;  not  that  sultry  and  sluggish  apathy  which  lazily 
welters  in  fleeting  expedients.  The  legitimist,  who 
would  establish  apathy  under  the  forms  of  monarchy ;  the 
agrarian,  who  would  establish  apathy  under  the  forms  01 
communism ;  are  both  mistaking  immobility  for  order, 
and  seeking  material  happiness  through  intellectual 
death.  Comfort  is  the  god  of  this  world,  but  comfort  it 
will  never  obtain  by  making  it  an  object. 

In  considering  the  national  life  of  our  own  country,  I 
would  wish  to  treat  it  neither  in  the  style  of  a  Jeremiad, 
nor  in  the  style  of  a  Fourth  of  July  oration.  Our  national 
life  is  peculiar,  not  only  as  a  composite  formed  from  an 
imperfect  fusion  of  different  races,  but  it  is  open  to  influ- 
ences from  all  ages  and  all  times.  Though  a  civiliza- 
tion may  die,  it  leaves  imperishable  records  of  itself  in 
history  and  in  literature,  and  these,  after  the  nation 
itself  is  dead,  become  living  and  active  agents  m  mould- 
ing the  natures  of  all  with  whom  they  come  in  contact. 
Accordingly,  as  everybody  here  reads  or  listens,  India, 
Greece,  and  Rome,  as  well  as  Germany,  France,  and 
England,  rush  into  our  national  life  through  a  thousand 
conductors,  —  their  diseased  as  well  as  healthy  elements 
becoming  objects  which  we  assimilate,  and  which  palpa- 
bly affect  our  conduct.  The  conceit  of  Greece,  the  pride 
of  Rome,  the  arrogance  of  feudal  Europe,  speak  and  act 
in  America  to-day,  from  the  lips  and  in  the  lives  of  dem- 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  213 


ocrat  and  moneycrat,  of  philanthropist  and  misanthrope. 
The  national  life,  in  short,  is  to  a  certain  extent  diseased, 
and  our  people  more  or  less  believe  in  the  capital  error 
that  they  can  thrive  by  selfishness,  injustice,  and  energy 
unregulated  by  law. 

This  wilful  element  is  so  modified  by  institutions,  that 
itf~the  northerner  it  appears  as  conceit,  in  the  southerner 
ns  pride.  Both  doubtless  possess  great  virtues,  but  as 
ooth  are  sufficiently  well  acquainted  with  that  fact,  let 
us  here  dwell  ungraciously  on  the  vices  of  each.  The 
leading  defect  of  the  Yankee  consists  in  the  gulf  which 
separates  his  moral  opinions  from  his  moral  principles. 
His  talk  about  virtue  in  the  abstract  would  pass  as  sound 
in  a  nation  of  saints,  but  he  still  contrives  that  his  inter- 
ests shall  not  suffer  by  the  rigidity  of  his  maxims.  He 
goes,  so  to  speak,  for  the  linen  decencies  of  sin ;  and  the 
Evil  One,  being  an  accommodating  personage,  will  as 
readily  appear  in  satin  slippers  as  in  cloven  hoofs.  Your 
true  Yankee,  indeed,  has  a  spruce,  clean,  Pecksniffian 
way  of  doing  a  wrong,  which  is  inimitable.  He  passes 
resolutions  declaring  himself  the  most  moral  and  relig- 
ious man  in  the  land,  and  then,  with  the  solemn  strut  of 
an  Alsatian  hero,  proceeds  to  the  practical  business  of 
life.  Believing,  after  a  certain  fashion,  in  justice  and 
retribution,  he  still  thinks  that  a  sly,  shrewd,  keen,  sup- 
ple gentleman  like  himself,  can  dodge,  in  a  quiet  way, 


!il4  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH    AND   DISEASE. 

the  moral  laws  of  the  universe,  without  any  particular 
pother  being  made  about  it.  He  is  a  self-admiration 
society  in  one.  He  will  never  be  first  in  a  scheme  of 
rapine ;  but,  once  drawn  in,  to  him,  as  to  Macbeth,  re- 
turning is  as  tedious  as  go  on.  If  you  ask  his  opinion 
about  a  recent  war,  he  will  put  on  a  moral  face,  declare 
bloodshed  to  be  an  exceedingly  naughty  business,  and 
roll  off  a  series  of  resounding  schoolboy  commonplaces, 
as  though  he  expected  a  choir  of  descending  angels  had 
paused  in  mid  air  to  hear  and  be  edified ;  but  then,  he 
adds,  with  a  compromising  chuckle,  that  it  was  an  amaz- 
ingly bright  thing  though,  that  whipping  of  the  Mexi- 
cans !  Here  it  is,  —  he  really  believes  in  whipping  the 
weak.  He  loves  energy  in  itself,  apart  from  the  pur- 
poses which  make  energy  beneficent;  and  as  he  is  apt  to 
deem  his  intelligence  appropriately  employed  in  preying 
on  those  who  have  less,  his  practical  philosophy  has  some- 
times found  vent  in  that  profound  and  elegant  maxim, — 
"  Every  one  for  himself,  and  Satan  catch  the  hindmost." 
True,  Satan  does  catch  the  hindmost,  but  all  history 
teaches  that  in  the  end  he  catches  the  foremost  also. 

But,  I  think  I  hear  you  ask,  what  say  you  of  our  phi- 
lanthropy ?  Certainly  nothing  here  as  to  its  beneficent 
action,  but  a  word  as  to  its  diseased  aspect.  It  is  to  be 
feared  that  our  benevolence  is  more  opinion  than  life, 
and,  accordingly,  it  is  apt  to  degenerate  into  sentiment- 


INTELLECTUAL  HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  215 

ality  or  malice ;  to  be  mere  inoffensively  ineffective 
primer  morality  and  elegant  recreation  of  conscience,  or 
morose,  snappish  and  snarling  invective  ;  in  other  words, 
to  lack  will,  or  to  be  wilful.  In  a  community  whose  life 
is  in  any  way  diseased,  it  is  difficult  for  the  best  men  to 
escape  the  ruling  contagion ;  to  oppose  an  evil  without 

"cajching  it ;  to  war  with  the  devil  without  using  the 
* 
devil's  own  weapons. 

But  perhaps  the  chief  Satanic  element  in  our  national 
life  comes  from  the  south.  There,  in  the  "full  tide"  of 
unsuccessful  "  experiment,"  is  a  feudal  system,  modified 
by  modern  humanity,  but  modified  also  by  modern  thrift. 
The  feudal  baron  did  not  sell  his  serfs.  Now,  this  pecu- 
liar institution  has  one  vital  evil  which  alone  would  ruin 
any  country  outside  of  Adam's  paradise,  —  it  makes 
labor  disreputable.  But  it  is  bad  in  every  respect,  cor- 
rupting the  life  both  of  master  and  slave ;  and  it  will  in- 
evitably end,  if  allowed  to  work  out  its  own  damnation,  in 
a  storm  of  fire  and  blood,  or  in  mental  and  moral  sterility 
and  death.  Looking  at  it,  not  sentimentally  or  shrewishly, 
much  less  with  any  mean  feeling  of  local  exultation,  but 
simply  with  the  eye  of  reason, — what  is  it  but  a  rude  and 
shallow  system  of  government,  which  has  been  tried  over 
and  over  again,  and  exploded  over  and  over  again,  the 
mere  cast-off  nonsense  of  extinct  civilizations,  bearing  on 
its  front  the  sign  of  being  a  more  stupid  blunder  than  it 


216  INTELLECTUAL  HEALTH  AND   DISEASE. 

is  a  crime?  Now,  we  can  sympathize  with  a  person  whc 
has  had  the  gout  transmitted  to  him,  the  only  legacy  of 
a  loving  father;  but  that  a  man  should  go  deliberately  tc 
work,  bottle  in  hand,  to  establish  the  gout  in  his  own 
system,  is  an  absurdity  which  touches  the  Quixotic  ir 
diabolism.  Yet  this,  or  something  like  to  this,  has  beer 
gravely  proposed,  and  some  of  our  southern  brethren 
have  requested  us  to  aid  in  the  ludicrously  iniquitous 
work.  No ;  we  should  say  to  these  gentlemen,  —  If  you 
have  a  taste  for  the  ingenuities  of  mischief,  plant,  if  you 
will,  on  your  new  territory,  small-pox  and  typhus  fever 
plant  plague,  cholera  and  pestilence,  but  refrain,  if  noi 
from  common  honesty,  at  least  from  common  intelligence, 
from  planting  a  moral  disease  infinitely  more  destructive 
and  which  will  make  the  world  shake  with  laughter  01 
execrations,  according  as  men  consider  the  madness  of 
its  folly,  or  the  brazen  impudence  of  its  guilt. 

In  these  remarks  on  Intellectual  Disease,  I  have  refer- 
red all  along,  negatively  at  least,  to  Intellectual  Health. 
We  have  seen  that  this  health  consists  neither  in  the 
self-abandonment  of  the  sensitively  weak,  nor  the  self- 
worship  of  the  wilfully  strong.  A  few  words  more,  tc 
guard  against  some  possible  misconceptions.  Self-direc- 
tion of  mental  power,  which  has  been  assumed  as  the 
condition  of  healthy  mind,  is  the  only  possible  means  of 
^lf-devotion,  of  self-sacrifice,  of  rising  above  self.  It 


INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AND   DISEASE.  217 

indicates  a  mind  serene,  cheerful,  hopeful,  courageous, 
ever  active,  ever  aspiring,  with  reverence  for  all  above 
itself,  and  genial  love,  not  bitter  contempt,  for  all  below. 
But  I  might  well  be  accused  of  shallow  philosophy,  did  I 
leave  the  subject  here.     Mind,  it  is  true,  is  free  spiritual 
force,  but  it  is  inscrutably  dependent  on  the  Force  which 
.-"created  it.     It  is  a  cause,  but  a  limited  cause  ;  a  power, 
constituted  such  by  an  Infinite  Power ;  and  it  grows 
mightier  as  it  ascends  to  its  Source.     In  this  connection, 
let  me  not  presume  to  speak,  but  call  witnesses  from  the 
mountain  peaks  and  pinnacles  of  intellect,  —  beings  who 
rose  thither  in  virtue  of  an  amazing  force  directed  up- 
wards, —  that  they  may  testify  to  their  deep  sense  of 
;his  mysterious  dependence.     Thus  Newton  closes  the 
greatest  work  of  pure  science  which  ever  came  from  the 
nind  of  man,  with  an  affecting  thanksgiving  to  that  Infi- 
lite  Intelligence  who  bestowed  the  power  which  produced 
t.     Thus  Spenser,  with  his  exhaustless  opulence  of  fan- 
iful  creation,  and  burning  sense  of  the  loveliness  of 
hings,  can  still  find  in  the  world  of  nature  and  the  world 
pf  imagination  no  fit  symbols  of  the  Vision  which  haunts 
iis  soul,  until  it  is  lifted  up  in  a  "  Hymn  to  Heavenly 
Jeauty."     Thus  Milton,  in  whom  glowed  a  spirit  that 
raved  every  storm  of  fortune  and  spurned  every  touch 
f  fear,  from  whose  brow  glanced  harmless  the  thunders 
f  dominant  hierarchies,  and  who  opposed  to  unnatural 


218  INTELLECTUAL   HEALTH   AISD   DISEASE. 

persecution  adamantine  will,  still  never  "  soared  in  the 
high  reason  of  his  fancies,  with  his  garland  and  singing 
robes  about  him,"  without  first,  in  his  own  divine  words, 
"  pouring  out  his  soul  in  devout  prayer  to  that  Eternal 
Spirit,  who  can  enrich  with  all  utterance  and  knowledge, 
and  sends  out  His  Seraphim,  with  the  hallowed  fire  of 
His  altar,  to  touch  and  purify  the  lips  of  whom  He 
pleases."  And  from  one  of  England's  most  curious  and 
not  least  sceptical  of  intellects,  a  deep  and  prying 
inquirer  into  the  mysteries  of  his  consciousness,  comes 
that  burst  of  mournful  rapture,  which  has  awed  and 
thrilled  every  soul  in  which  it  has  entered,  that  "there 
is  a  common  spirit  which  plays  within  us  yet  makes  no 
part  of  us,  the  Spirit  of  God,  the  fire  and  scintillation  of 
that  noble  and  mighty  essence  which  is  the  life  and 
radical  heat  of  all  minds  ;  and,"  he  adds,  "  whosoever 
feels  not  the  warm  breath  and  gentle  ventilation  of  this 
spirit,  (though  I  feel  his  pulse,)  I  cannot  say  he  lives  • 
for,  truly,  without  this,  to  me  there  is  no  heat  under  the 
tropic,  and  no  light,  though  I  dwelt  in  the  very  body  of 
the  sun." 


USE  AND  MISUSE  OF  WOKDS* 


WE  congratulate  that  large,  respectable,  inexpressive, 
and  unexpressed  class  of  thinkers,  who  are  continually 
complaining  of  the  barrenness  of  their  vocabulary  as 
compared  with  the  affluence  of  their  ideas,  on  the  ap- 
pearance of  Dr.  Roget's  volume.  If  it  does  nothing  else, 
it  will  bring  a  popular  theory  of  verbal  expression  to 
the  test ;  and  if  that  theory  be  correct,  we  count  upon 
witnessing  a  mob  of  previously  mute  Miltons  and  Ba- 
cons, and  speechless  Chathams  and  Burkes,  crowding 
and  tramping  into  print.  Dr.  Roget,  for  a  moderate 
fee,  prescribes  the  verbal  medicine  which  will  relieve 
the  congestion  of  their  thoughts.  All  the  tools  and 

*  Thesaurus  of  English  Words,  so  classified  and  arranged  as  to 
facilitate  the  Expression  of  Ideas  and  assist  in  Literary  Composi- 
tion. By  Peter  Mark  Roget,  late  Secretary  of  the  Royal  Society, 
Author  of  the  Bridgewater  Treatise  on  Animal  and  Vegetable 
Physiology,  etc.  Revised  and  edited,  with  a  List  of  Foreign  Words, 
defined  in  English,  and  other  Additions,  by  Barnas  Scars,  D.  D., 
Secretary  of  the  Massachusetts  Board  of  Education.  Boston  : 
Gould  and  Lincoln.  12mo.  pp.  468. 


220  USE   AND   MISUSE   OF    WORDS. 

implements  employed  by  all  the  poets  and  philosophers 
of  England  can  be  obtained  at  his  shop.  The  idea  being 
given,  he  guarantees  in  every  case  to  supply  the  word. 
Dr.  Sears,  the  American  editor,  has,  it  is  true,  deemed 
it  his  duty  to  retrench  the  exuberance  of  the  original 
in  the  phraseology  of  slang,  and  has  thus  made  it  a  use- 
less book  to  a  numerous  and  constantly  increasing  class 
of  beaux-esprits,  whose  conceptions  and  passions  would 
find  no  adequate  vent  in  any  dialect  milder  and  clean- 
lier than  that  which  derives  its  force  and  flavor  from 
Billingsgate  and  Wapping ;  but  for  all  ordinary  pur- 
poses, either  of  copiousness  or  condensation,  of  elegance 
or  energy,  Dr.  Roget's  volume,  as  weeded  by  Dr.  Sears, 
will  be  found  to  be  amply  sufficient.  Indeed,  if  the  apt 
use  of  words  be  a  mechanical  exercise,  we  cannot  doubt 
that  this  immense  mass  of  the  raw  material  of  expres- 
sion will  be  rapidly  manufactured  into  histpry,  philoso- 
phy, poetry,  and  eloquence. 

Seriously,  we  consider  this  book  as  one  of  the  best 
of  a  numerous  class,  whose  aim  is  to  secure  the  results 
without  imposing  the  tasks  of  labor,  to  arrive  at  ends 
by  a  dexterous  dodging  of  means,  to  accelerate  the 
tongue  without  accelerating  the  faculties.  It  is  an  out- 
side remedy  for  an  inward  defect.  In  our  opinion,  the 
work  mistakes  the  whole  process  by  which  living  thought 
makes  its  way  into  living  words,  and  it  might  be  thor- 


USE    AND    MISUSE   OP   WORDS  221 

oughly  mastered  without  conveying  any  real  power  or 
facility  of  expression.  In  saying  this,  we  do  not  mean 
that  the  knack  of  mechanical  rhetoric  may  not  be  more 
readily  caught,  and  that  fluency  in  the  use  of  words  may 
not  be  increased,  by  its  study.  But  rhetoric  is  not  a 
knack,  and  fluency  is  not  expression.  The  crop  of 
'ready  writers,  of  correct  writers,  of  elegant  writers,  of 
writers  capable  of  using  words  in  every  mode  but  the 
right  one,  is  already  sufficiently  large  to  meet  the  cur- 
rent demand  for  intellectual  husk,  chaff,  and  stubble. 
The  tendency  of  the  time  to  divorce  the  body  of  words 
from  the  soul  of  expression,  and  to  shrivel  up  language 
into  a  mummy  of  thought,  would  seem  to  need  the  rein 
rather  than  the  whip.  The  most  cursory  glance  over 
much  of  the  "  literature  "  of  the  day,  so  called,  will 
indicate  the  peculiar  form  of  marasmus  under  which 
the  life  of  language  is  in  danger  of  being  slowly  con- 
sumed. The  most  hopeless  characteristic  of  this  literar 
ture  is  its  complacent  exhibition  of  distressing  excel- 
lences,—  its  evident  incapacity  to  rise  into  promising 
faults.  The  terms  are  such  as  are  employed  by  the 
best  writers,  the  grammar  is  good,  the  morality  excel- 
lent, the  information  accurate,  the  reflections  sensible, 
yet  the  whole  composition  neither  contains  nor  can 
communicate  intellectual  or  moral  life  ;  and  a  critical 
eulogium  on  its  merits  sounds  like  the  certificate  of  a 


222  USE   AND   MISUSE   OF   WORDS. 

schoolmaster  as  to  the  negative  virtues  of  his  pupils. 
This  fluent  debility,  which  never  stumbles  into  ideas 
nor  stutters  into  passion,  which  calls  its  commonplace 
comprehensiveness,  and  styles  its  sedate  languor  repose, 
would,  if  put  upon  a  short  allowance  of  words,  and 
compelled  to  purchase  language  at  the  expense  of  con- 
quering obstacles,  be  likely  to  evince  some  spasms  of 
genuine  expression  ;  but  it  is  hardly  reasonable  to  expect 
such  verbal  abstemiousness  at  a  period  when  the  whole 
wealth  of  the  English  tongue  is  placed  at  the  disposal 
of  the  puniest  whipsters  of  rhetoric,  —  when  the  art  of 
writing  is  avowedly  taught  on  the  principle  of  imitating 
the  "  best  models,"  —  when  words  are  worked  into  the 
ears  of  the  young  in  the  hope  that  something  will  be 
found  answering  to  them  in  their  brains,  —  and  when 
Dr.  Peter  Mark  Roget,  who  never  happened  on  a  verbal 
felicity  or  uttered  a  "  thought-executing "  word  in  the 
course  of  his  long  and  useful  life,  rushes  about,  book  in 
hand,  to  tempt  unthinking  and  unimpassioned  medioc- 
rity into  the  delusion,  that  its  disconnected  glimpses  of 
truths  never  fairly  grasped,  and  its  faint  movements  of 
embryo  aspirations  which  never  broke  their  shell,  can 
be  worded  by  his  specifics  into  creative  thought  and 
passion.  The  bill  of  fare  is  indeed  immense ;  what  a 
pity  that  the  absence  of  such  insignificant  elements  as 
mouths,  stomachs,  and  the  appetite  of  hunger  may  pre- 
clude the  possibility  of  a  feast ! 


USE   AND   MISUSE   OF   WORDS.  223 

Far,  therefore,  from  being  disposed  to  increase  the 
vocabulary  of  such  writers,  and  students  of  the  art  of 
writing,  by  books  like  this  "Thesaurus,"  we  grudge 
them  the  words  they  have  already  pressed  into  their 
service.  They  have  not  earned  the  right  to  use  their 
words  by  exercising  any  inward  energy  of  thought  on 
J$ie  things  to  which  they  relate.  The  first  condition  of 
true  expression  is  an  effort  of  mind,  which  restrains 
rather  than  stimulates  fluency.  The  ease  with  which 
accredited  maxims  derived  through  the  ear  can  be 
attached  to  words  which  have  been  decoyed  through 
the  same  populous  thoroughfare,  offers  a  desperate 
temptation  to  avoid  the  trouble  equally  of  thinking 
and  expressing.  The  ears  write.  Take,  for  example, 
the  truths  of  morality  and  religion,  which  unrealizing 
minds  and  rapid  pens  have  so  hardened  into  truisms, 
that  it  has  become  a  mark  of  genius  to  restore  and  re- 
vivify their  original  freshness  and  power.  Now  there 
are  few  creatures  so  pitiable  as  to  need  information  on 
these  topics,  and  few  writers  so  stupid  as  to  be  unable 
to  give  it.  What  is  required  is,  not  information,  but 
inspiration.  The  maxims  and  doctrines  are  the  com- 
monest furniture  of  the  commonest  minds.  The  office, 
therefore,  of  the  moralist  is  to  impart,  not  moral  tru- 
isms, but  moral  life.  The  office  of  the  preacher  is,  not 
to  communicate  the  forms  of  religious  doctrine,  but  to 


224:  tfSE   AND   MISUSE   OF   WORDS. 

infuse  the  substance  of  religious  vitality.  All  moral- 
izin»  and  all  preaching  are  ineffective  which  do  not 
thus  strike  through  the  understanding  directly  at  the 
will,  and  purify  and  invigorate  the  sources  of  moral  and 
religious  action.  But  to  do  this  requires  a  face-to-fr.ce 
knowledge  of  the  truths  to  be  driven  home,  —  vivid  in- 
ward experience  poured  out  in  living,  breathing,  palpi- 
tating words.  The  man  who  eliminates  from  these 
universal  principles  their  divine  significance  and  awful 
beauty,  and  prattles  about  them  as  truisms,  soon  be- 
comes as  dull,  dry,  and  feeble  as  his  topics,  and  his 
poverty  of  soul  is  just  as  evident  when  his  diction  is 
elegant  and  copious  as  when  it  is  mean  and  pinched. 
The  treasures  of  language,  poured  into  such  a  mind, 
are  "  like  money  dropped  into  a  dead  man's  hand." 

What  is  really  wanted,  therefore,  "  to  facilitate  the 
expression  of  ideas,"  is  something  which  will  facilitate 
the  conception  of  ideas.  What  is  really  wanted  "  to 
assist  in  literary  composition,"  is  a  true  philosophy  of 
expression,  founded  on  a  knowledge  of  the  nature  and 
operations  of  the  mind,  and  of  the  vital  processes  by 
which  thought  incarnates  itself  in  words.  Expression 
is  a  purely  mental  act,  the  work  of  the  same  blended 
force  and  insight,  will  and  intelligence,  that  thinks.  Its 
power  and  clearness  answer  to  the  power  and  clearness 
of  the  mind  whence  it  proceeds.  Its  peculiarities  cor- 


USE    AND    MISUSE    OF   WORDS.  225 

respond  to  the  peculiarities  of  the  individual  nature  it 
represents.  Its  perfection  consists  in  identifying  words 
with  things,  —  in  bending  language  to  the  form,  and 
pervading  it  with  the  vitality,  of  the  thought  it  aims  to 
arrest  and  embody.  In  those  cases  where  thought 
transcends  the  sensuous  capacities  of  language  to  utter 
i|£  conceptions,  the  expression  will  still  magically  sug- 

£r 

gest  the  idea  or  mood  it  cannot  directly  convey,  just  as 
a  more  than  earthly  beauty  looks  out  from  the  beautiful 
faces  of  Raphael's  Madonnas,  indicating  the  subtile  pas- 
sage into  form  of  a  soul  and  sentiment  which  no  mere 
form  could  express.  There  are  no  more  simple  words 
than  "  green,"  "  sweetness,"  and  "  rest,"  yet  what  depth 
and  intensity  of  significance  shines  in  Chaucei*'s  "green," 
—  what  a  still  ecstasy  of  religious  bliss  irradiates 
"  sweetness,"  as  it  drops  from  the  pen  of  Jonathan  Ed- 
wards, —  what  celestial  repose  beams  from  "  rest  "  as 
it  lies  on  the  page  of  Barrow  !  The  moods  seem  to 
transcend  the  resources  of  language,  yet  they  are  ex- 
pressed in  common  words,  'transfigured,  sanctified,  im- 
paradised,  by  the  spiritual  vitality  which  streams  through 
them.  The  words  are  among  the  cheapest  articles  in 
Dr.  Roget's  voluminous  catalogue  ;  but  where  is  the 
cunning  rhetorician  who  can  obtain  them  there  ? 

Expression,   then,  whether  direct  or  suggestive,  is 
thought  in  the  words  or  through  the  words,  and  not 
15 


i 

V- 


226  USE    AND    MISUSE    OF    WORDS. 

thought  and  the  words.  Thought  implies  two  elements, 
the  subject  thinking  and  the  object  thought.  "When  the 
process  of  thinking  reaches  that  degree  of  intensity  in 
which  the  object  of  thought  is  seen  in  clear  vision,  — 
when  the  thinking  mind  comes  into  direct  contact  with 
the  objective  thing  or  idea  it  has  "  felt  after  "  and  found, 
—  the  words  which  it  then  weaves  "into  the  visible  gar- 
ment of  its  mingled  emotion  and  conception  are  words 
surcharged  and  flooded  with  life,  —  words  which  are 
living  things,  endowed  with  the  power,  not  only  to  com- 
municate ideas,  but  to  convey,  as  by  spiritual  conduc- 
tors, the  shock  and  thrill  which  attended  their  concep- 
tion. Instead  of  being  mere  barren  signs  of  abstract 
notions,  they  become  media  through  which  the  life  of 
one  mind  is  radiated  into  other  minds.  They  inspire  as 
well  as  inform ;  invigorate  as  well  as  enlighten.  Such 
language  is  the  spiritual  body  of  the  thinker,  which 
never  dies  or  grows  old,  but  has  a  relative  immortality 
on  earth,  and  makes  him  a  contemporary  with  all  suc- 
ceeding generations ;  for  in  such  language  not  only  are 
thoughts  embodied,  but  words  are  ensouled. 

The  fact  that  expression  like  this  is  beyond  the  power 
of  ordinary  minds  does  not  affect  its  value  as  a  guiding 
principle  of  rhetorical  education.  The  difficulty  is  that 
the  principle  is  not  generally  admitted.  It  is  supposed 
that  the  development  and  the  discipline  of  thought  are  to 


USE    AND    MISUSE    OF    WORDS.  22T 

be  conducted  apart  from  the  development  and  discipline 
of  the  power  of  expressing  thought.  Fill  your  head 
with  words,  and  when  you  get  an  idea -fit  it  to  them,  — 
this  is  the  current  mode,  prolific  in  famished  intellects 
and  starveling  expressions.  Hence  the  prevailing  lack 
of  intellectual  conscientiousness,  or  closeness  of  expres- 
/-sion  to  the  thing,  —  a  palpable  interval  between  them 
being  revealed  at  the  first  probe  of  analysis.  Words 
and  things  having  thus  no  vital  principle  of  union,  be- 
ing, in  fact,  attached  or  tied  together,  they  can  be  easily 
detached  or  unbound,  and  the  expression  accordingly 
bears  but  the  similitude  of  life. 

But  it  is  honorable  to  human  nature  that  men  hate 
to  write  unless  inspired  to  write.  As  soon  as  rhetoric 
becomes  a  mechanical  exercise  it  becomes  a  joyless 
drudgery,  and  drudgery  ends  in  a  mental  disgust  which 
impairs  even  the  power  to  drudge.  There  is  conse- 
quently a  continual  tendency  to  rebel  against  common- 
place, even  among  those  engaged  in  its  service.  But 
the  passage  from  this  intellectual  apathy  to  intellectual 
character  commonly  lies  through  intellectual  anarchy. 
The  literature  of  facts  connected  by  truisms,  and  the 
literature  of  things  connected  by  principles,  are  divided 
by  a  wide,  chaotic  domain,  appropriated  to  the  literature 
of  desperation  ;  and  generally  the  first  token  that  a  writ- 
er has  become  disgusted  with  the  truisms  of  the  under- 


228  USE   AND   MISUSE   OF    WORDS. 

standing  is  his  ostentatious  parade  of  the  paradoxes  of 
sensibility.  He  begins  to  rave  the  moment  he  ceases 
to  repeat. 

Now  the  vital  processes  of  thought  and  expression  are 
processes  of  no  single  faculty  or  impulse,  but  of  a  whole 
nature,  and  mere  sensibility,  or  mere  understanding,  or 
mere  imagination,  or 'mere  will,  can  never  of  itself  pro- 
duce the  effects  of  that  collected,  concentrated,  personal 
power,  in  which  will,  intellect,  and  sensibility  are  all 
consolidated  in  one  individuality.  The  utmost  strain 
and  stir  of  the  impulses  can  but  mimic  strength,  when 
they  are  disconnected  from  character.  Passion,  in  the 
minds  of  the  anarchists  of  letters,  instead  of  being  poured 
through  the  intellect  to  stimulate  intelligence  into  power, 
frets  and  foams  into  mere  passionateness.  It  does  not 
condense  the  faculty  in  which  it  inheres,  but  diffuses 
the  faculty  to  which  it  coheres.  It  makes  especial  claim 
to  force ;  but  the  force  of  simple  sensibility  is  a  preten- 
tious force,  evincing  no  general  might  of  nature,  no 
innate,  original,  self-centred  energy.  It  blusters  furi- 
ously about  its  personal  vigor,  and  lays  a  bullying  em- 
phasis on  the  "  ME,"  but  its  self-assertion  is  without 
self-poise  or  self-might  The  grand  object  of  its  tem- 
pestuous conceit  is  to  make  a  little  nature,  split  into 
fragmentary  faculties  and  impulses,  look  like  a  great 
nature,  stirred  by  strong  passions,  illumined  by  positive 


USE   AND   MISUSE   OF   WORDS.  229 

ideas,  and  directed  to  definite  ends.  And  it  must  be 
admitted  that,  so  far  as  the  public  is  concerned,  it  often 
succeeds  in  the  deception.  Commonplace,  though  crazed 
into  strange  shapes  by  the  delirium  tremens  of  sensibility, 
and  uttering  itself  in  strange  shrieks  and  screams,  is 
essentially  commonplace  still ;  but  it  often  passes  for  the 
£fte  frenzy  and  upward,  rocket-like  rush  of  impassioned 
imagination.  The  writer,  therefore,  who  is  enabled,  by 
a  felicitous  deformity  of  nature,  to  indulge  in  it,  contrives 
to  make  many  sensible  people  guilty  of  the  blasphemy 
of  calling  him  a  genius  ;  if  he  have  the  knack  of  rhym- 
ing, and  can  set  to  music  his  agonies  of  weakness 
and  ecstasies  of  imbecility,  he  is  puffed  as  a  great  poet, 
superior  to  all  the  restraints  of  artistic  law ;  and  he  is 
allowed  to  huddle  together  appetite  and  aspiration,  earth 
and  heaven,  man  and  God,  in  a  truculent  fashion  pe- 
culiarly his  own.  Hence  such  "popular"  poems  as 
Mr.  Bailey's  "  Festus  "  and  Mr.  Robert  Montgomery's 
"  Satan." 

The  misuse  of  words  in  this  literature  of  ungoverned 
or  ungovernable  sensibility  has  become  so  general  as  to 
threaten  the  validity  of  all  definitions.  The  connection 
between  sign  and  thing  signified  has  been  so  severed 
that  it  resembles  the  logic  of  that  eminent  master  of 
argumentation,  of  whom  it  was  said,  "  that  his  premises 
might  be  afflicted  with  the  confluent  small-pox  without 


230  USE   AND   MISUSE    OF   -WORDS. 

his  conclusion  being  in  any  danger  of  catching  it." 
Objects  are  distorted,  relations  disturbed,  language  put 
upon  the  rack  to  torment  it  into  intensity,  and  the  whole 
composition  seems,  like  Tennyson's  organ,  to  be  "  groan- 
ing for  power,"  yet  the  result  both  of  the  mental  and 
verbal  bombast  is  simply  a  feverish  feebleness,  equally 
infecting  thought  and  style.  Big  and  passionate  as  are 
the  words,  and  terrible  as  has  been  their  execution  in 
competent  hands,  they  resolutely  refuse  to  do  the  work 
of  dunces  and  maniacs.  The  spirits  are  called,  but 
they  decline  to  come. 

Yet  this  resounding  emptiness  of  diction  is  not  with- 
out popularity  and  influence,  though  its  popularity  has 
no  deep  roots  and  its  influence  is  shallow.  Its  superfi- 
cial effectiveness  is  indicated,  not  more  by  the  success 
of  the  passionate  men  who  fall  naturally  into  it,  than  by 
the  success  of  the  shrewd  men  who  coldly  imitate  it. 
Thus  Sheridan,  who  of  all  orators  had  the  least  sensi- 
bility and  the  most  wit  and  cunning,  adopted  in  many 
of  his  speeches  a  style  as  bloated  as  his  own  face,  full 
of  fustian  deliberately  manufactured,  and  rant  betraying 
the  most  painful  elaboration.  Our  own  legislative  elo- 
quence is  singularly  rich  in  speeches  whose  diction  is 
a  happy  compound  of  politic  wrath  and  flimsy  fancies, 
glowing  with  rage  worthy  of  Counsellor  Phillips's  phi- 
lippics, and  spangled  with  flowers  that  might  have  been 


USE   AND   MISUSE   OP   WORDS.  231 

gathered  in  the  garden  of  Mr.  Hervey's  "  Meditations." 
But  we  should  do  great  injustice  to  these  orators  if  we 
supposed  them  as  foolish  as  they  try  to  make  themselves 
appear  in  their  eloquence  ;  and  it  is  safe  to  impute  more 
than  ordinary  reptile  sagacity,  and  more  than  ordinary 
skill  in  party  management,  to  those  politicians  who  in- 
dulge in  more  than  ordinary  nonsense  in  their  declama- 
tions. The  incapacity  to  feel,  which  their  bombast 
evinces,  proves  they  are  in  no  danger  of  being  whirled 
into  imprudences  by  the  mad  emotions  they  affect. 
Such  oratory,  however,  has  a  brassy  taint  and  ring  in- 
expressibly distasteful  both  to  the  physical  and  intellec- 
tual sense,  and  its  deliberate  hypocrisy  of  feeling  is  a 
sure  sign  of  profligacy  of  mind. 

It  is  only,  however,  when  sensibility  is  genuine  and 
predominant,  that  it  produces  that  anarchy  of  the  intel- 
lect in  which  the  literature  of  desperation,  as  contrasted 
with  the  literature  of  inspiration,  has  its  source.  The 
chief  characteristic  of  this  literature  is  absence  of  re- 
straint. Its  law  is  lawlessness.  It  is  developed  accord- 
ing to  no  interior  principle  of  growth  ;  it  adapts  itself 
to  no  exterior  principle  of  art.  In  view  of  this,  it  is 
somewhat  singular  that  so  large  a  portion  of  its  products 
should  be  characterized  by  such  essential  mediocrity, 
since  it  might  be  supposed  that  an  ordinary  nature, 
disordered  by  passion,  and  unrestrained  by  law,  with  a 


232  USE   AND    MISUSE   OF   WORDS. 

brain  made  irritable,  if  not  sensitive,  by  internal  rage, 
would  exhibit  some  hysteric  bursts  of  genius.  But  a 
sharp  inspection  reveals,  in  a  majority  of  cases,  that  it 
is  the  old  commonplace  galvanized.  Its  heat  is  not  that 
of  fire,  but  of  hot  water,  and  no  fusing  power  is  per- 
ceptible in  its  weltering  expanse.  We  are  reluctantly 
compelled  to  admit  that  chaos  cannot  create,  and  that 
a  great  display  of  fussiness  may  be  consistent  with  a 
lamentable  lack  of  force. 

Even  in  those  writers  in  whom  this  sensibility  is 
connected  with  some  genius,  and  the  elements  of  whose 
minds  exhibit  marks  of  spontaneous  power,  we  are  con- 
tinually impressed  with  the  impotence  of  anarchy  to 
create,  or  combine,  or  portray.  They  never  present  the 
thing  itself  about  which  they  rave,  but  only  their  feel- 
ings about  the  thing.  They  project  into  nature  and  life 
the  same  confusion  of  objects  and  relations  which  exists 
in  their  own  minds,  and  stir  without  satisfying.  That 
misrepresentation  is  a  mental  as  well  as  moral  offence, 
and  that  no  intellect  is  sound  unless  it  be  conscientiously 
close  to  the  truth  of  things  in  perception  and  expres- 
sion, are  maxims  which  they  scorn  to  allow  as  checks 
on  their  freedom  of  impulse.  But  with  all  their  bluster, 
they  cannot  conceal  the  limitation  of  their  natures  in 
the  impudence  of  their  claims. 

And  this  brings  us  to  the  consideration  of  words  as 


USE   AND   MISUSE   OF   WORDS.  233 

media  for  the  emission  and  transpiration  of  character, 
—  as  expressions,  not  simply  of  thoughts  or  emotions, 
but  of  natures,  —  as  modes  by  which  literature  is  per- 
vaded with  vitality  and  peopled  with  men,  so  that  a 
criticism  on  styles  is  resolved  into  an  exposition  of 
persons.  This  function  of  language  seems  to  us  its 
odMest,  because  its  honestest  function.  "Words,  to  be 
sure,  never  really  lie,  though  appearances  are  sometimes 
strongly  against  them.  The  truth  leaks  out  from  the 
most  hypocritical  sentences;  and  we  have  repeatedly 
read  books,  manufactured  on  Dr.  Roget's  pattern,  in 
which  the  words  seemed  to  feel  degraded  by  the  drudg- 
ery they  were  engaged  in ;  to  a  practised  ear  audibly 
grumbled  at  being  turned  from  "  nimble  servitors  "  into 
stupid  slaves ;  and  every  moment  eagerly  gave  in  evi- 
dence against  their  taskmasters.  Again,  it  is  undoubt- 
edly true,  that  a  good  portion  of  the  sensuality,  vulgar- 
ity, misanthropy,  malignity,  and  littleness  of  soul,  which 
take  a  literary  form,  is  communicated  in  the  phrases  and 
images  of  their  opposites,  but  communicated  almost  as 
effectively  as  if  the  words  were  drawn  from  the  fish- 
market,  instead  of  being  drawn  from  the  Bible.  Indeed, 
if  there  be  any  animating  life  behind  or  within  a  com- 
position, that  peculiar  life,  and  no  other,  will  escape 
into  the  consciousness  of  the  reader,  without  regard  to 
the  nature  of  the  opinions  or  the  language  in  which 


234  USE   AND   MISUSE   OF    WORDS. 

they  are  clothed.  A  Satanic  drop  in  the  blood  makes  a 
clergyman  preach  diabolism  from  scriptural  texts,  and  a 
philanthropist  inculcate  misanthropy  from  the  rostrum 
of  reform.  It  is  all  love  in  words,  all  hatred  in  spirit ; 
and  the  Devil  is  content.  An  oversight  of  this  obvious 
principle  converts  criticism  into  a  mere  gibberish.  Take, 
for  instance,  such  writers  as  P.  J.  Bailey  and  Alexan- 
der Smith,  two  of  the  most  hopeful  desperadoes  of 
"young  literature,"  quick  in  apprehension,  fertile  in 
fancy,  ravenous  in  impulse,  and  whose  sad  baggage  of 
a  muse  has  been  loudly  hailed  as  the  true  celestial 
maiden  on  the  sole  evidence  of  her  robes.  Doubtless, 
through  the  crack  in  their  heads  split  by  passion,  we 
have  a  view  of  quite  a  splendid  anarchy  of  faculties  and 
sensibilities,  —  doubtless  they  are  adorned  with  some  of 
the  most  gorgeous  trappings  of  poetry,  —  but  still  they 
are  not  essentially  poets.  They  give  us,  not  poetry, 
but  a  poetic  debauch.  They  evince  an  appetite  for  the 
ideal,  rather  than  a  sentiment  for  it,  and  whether  it 
pleases  them  to  soar  into  heaven  or  dive  into  hell, 
whether  they  take  us  among  saints  or  sinners,  a  pre- 
dominant animalism,  penetrating  every  shining  phrase 
and  image,  is  the  impression  they  stamp  upon  the  mind. 
The  thing  does  not  taste  well  in  the  mouth,  —  gives  no 
ideal  pleasure  or  satisfaction ;  and,  for  our  own  part,  we 
confess  a  preference  for  Dante,  Milton,  and  Goethe  on 


USE    AND    MISUSE    OF    WORDS.  235 

the  same  themes,  though  we  cheerfully  admit  their 
inferiority  in  intellectual  topsy-turviness  and  the  blaze 
of  words.  Were  the  powers  and  passions  of  these  des- 
perate gentlemen  harmonized  into  unity,  we  should  see 
at  once  how  moderate  is  the  real  size  and  weight  of 
natures,  which  appear  of  such  astounding  dimensions  and 
force  in  their  shattered  state.  By  this  compression, 
however,  they  might  dwindle  into  —  poets,  —  poets  of 
the  second  class,  it  is  true,  but  still  poets,  which  they 
are  altogether  too  splendid  and  sublime  to  be  at 
present. 

If  the  latent  nature  of  a  writer  thus  struggles  through 
his  words,  and  hypocrisy,  conscious  or  unconscious,  in 
his  mode  of  writing,  fails  to  conceal  his  disposition,  — 
if  mental  anarchy,  though  wielding  all  the  external 
resources  of  language,  can  still  express  only  itself,  — 
there  would  seem  to  be  very  strong  inducements  in 
literature  for  authors  to  be  honest.  Many  a  poor  wight, 
who  struts  in  the  purple  and  fine  linen  of  verbiage,  a 
target  for  criticism,  would  be  an  interesting  object  if  he 
were  content  with  the  homely  suits  which  exactly  fit 
his  conceptions.  Every  writer  whose  aim  is  not  to 
appear,  but  to  be,  and  who  directs  his  powers  to  the 
expression  of  what  he  really  is,  succeeds,  at  least,  in 
making  himself  readable ;  for  such  a  writer  urges  no 
opinions  which  have  not  been  domesticated  in  his  own 


236  USE    AND    MISUSE    OF    WORDS. 

understanding,  testifies  to  no  facts  which  are  not  reali- 
ties to  his  own  consciousness,  and  uses  no  words  which 
he  has  not  earned  the  right  to  use  by  testing  their  con- 
formity to  his  own  impressions  or  insight.  And  it  is 
curious  how  flexible  language  becomes  when  a  writer's 
vocabulary  is  thus  limited  by  his  intellectual  character, 
and  with  what  ease  a  few  words  do  the  whole  business 
of  expression.  A  presiding  personality,  indeed,  acts  as 
a  magnet;  all  related  words  come  tripping  to  it,  as 
if  eager  and  glad  to  leave  their  limbo  of  generality  and 
to  form  part  of  a  new  organism ;  to  feel  through  their 
shrunken  veins  the  flow  and  throb  of  fresh,  warm  blood, 
and  to  partake  in  the  rapture  of  individual  existence. 
Then  language  really  becomes  alive,  and  thus,  too, 
books  attain  the  power  to  live.  All  others,  after  a  few 
convulsive  efforts,  die  and  are  forgotten,  or  are  known 
only  to  the  antiquary  who  prowls  among  the  cemeteries 
of  letters,  reading  inscriptions  on  tombstones. 

We  do  not,  of  course,  mean  to  assert  that  all  indi- 
vidualities that  take  a  literary  form  become  conspicuous 
in  becoming  genuine.  The  compositions  which  embody 
poverty  and  littleness  of  individual  being  must  exist  in 
the  obscurity  in  which  they  were  born ;  but  they  still 
exist.  The  benevolent  literary  historian  who  visits 
them  in  their  dingy  paper  hovels  always  finds  them  in 
a  wretched  condition,  but  always  finds  them  alive. 


USE    AND    MISUSE   OF   WORDS.  237 

Perhaps  the  lowest  form  of  what  we  call  intellectual 
character  is  visible  in  the  pamphlets  of  those  political 
hacks,  who,  from  Walpole's  time  to  that  of  Lord  Chat- 
ham, were  employed  by  booksellers  and  statesmen  to 
enlighten  the  British  public  on  national  affairs,  —  in 
other  words,  to  do  the  dirty  work  of  politics.  These 
nWn  undoubtedly  exhibit  singular  littleness  of  nature, 
and  singular  feebleness  of  vitality  ;  but  still  their  minds 
act  as  units,  and  every  sentence  is  steeped  in  the  mean- 
ness and  malevolence  in  which  their  whole  life  seems 
to  have  been  absorbed.  We  are  afraid  that  a  dispas- 
sionate criticism  must  give  them  the  appellation  of  raga- 
muffins and  sneaks ;  but  yet  it  is  due  to  them  to  say 
that  they  are  not  ashamed  of  their  characters,  whether 
they  were  natural  from  their  cradles,  or  acquired  in  the 
garrets  of  Osborne  and  Mist.  They  are  most  assuredly 
stupid,  very  stupid ;  but  then  their  stupidity  is  a  posi- 
tive, and  not  a  negative  quality.  Throughout  their 
writings  we  observe  quite  a  laudable  persistence  in 
kind  and  fidelity  to  type,  without  any  eccentric  rhetor- 
ical deviations  into  brilliancy  or  decency.  As  we  read 
them,  even  at  this  late  day,  their  natures  appear  to 
ooze  or  dribble  out  in  the  vapid  emphasis  of  every 
italicized  word,  in  the  sly  venom  of  every  insinuated 
scandal,  in  the  limping  movement  of  every  dismal  witti- 
cism, in  the  lowness  of  all  the  lying  statements,  in  the 


238  USE   AND   MISUSE   OF   WORDS. 

impotence  of  all  the  toothless  sarcasms,  in  the  vagabond 
disorder  of  all  the  rags  of  rhetoric.  But  then  it  is 
pleasant  occasionally  to  be  in  the  company  of  dunces 
who  are  so  complacent  in  their  duncery,  who  are  stirred 
by  no  fretful  aspiration  to  be  fine  writers,  who  are  so 
thoroughly  content  with  the  puddle  in  which  they  live, 
and  who,  as  true  artists  of  the  little  and  the  low,  would 
disdain  to  borrow  the  snapping  terseness  of  Pope's 
verse,  or  the  flowing  richness  of  Bolingbroke's  prose, 
or  the  manner  of  any  other  "  eminent  hands  "  and  "  per- 
sons of  honor,"  in  order  to  give  their  lean  thoughts  and 
reptile  dispositions  a  more  splendid  verbal  raiment  than 
the  characteristic  one  supplied  from  their  own  ward- 
robes. These  writers,  too,  are  by  far  the  most  honest 
of  their  kind.  Minds  as  small  and  natures  as  mean  as 
theirs  have  since  addressed  themselves  to  similar  tasks 
without  displaying  similar  frankness.  From  the  time 
of  Junius  and  Burke,  the  tomtits  of  English  politics 
have  sported  the  beaks  and  talons,  and  arrayed  them- 
selves in  the  plumage,  of  the  vultures  and  the  eagles. 
The  feeblest  rancor  aspires  to  wear  the  aspect  of  rave- 
nous malignity,  and  the  weakest  pugnacity  would  tower 
and  scream  in  the  regions  of  imaginative  passion. 

The  next  form  of  intellectual  character,  whose  verbal 
expression  rewards  analysis,  is  found  in  those  men  who 
deal  with  obvious  facts  and  principles,  but  really  grasp 


USE    AND   MISUSE    OF   WORDS.  239 

and  handle  them.  Their  sense  is  common  sense,  but 
common  sense  as  character,  not  as  hearsay.  All  their 
notions  are  organized  into  abilities  and  written  out  in 
their  lives ;  truisms  from  their  lips  have  the  effect  of 
original  perceptions  ;  and  old  saws  and  proverbs,  worn 
to  shreds  by  constant  repetition,  startle  the  ear  like 
brilliant  fancies,  when  uttered  by  men  whose  disposi- 
tions <they  have  formed  and  whose  actions  theyMve 
guided.  Such  persons  are  commonly  narrow  and  big- 
oted, and  profess  great  contempt  for  everything  that  lies 
beyond  the  range  of  their  vision.  They  delight,  indeed, 
to  call  their  opinions  "  views,"  in  order,  it  would  seem, 
to  suggest  the  test  of  sight  to  which  they  have  been 
subjected  ;  and  they  give  them  additional  emphasis  by 
putting  them  in  the  possessive  case.  They  are  not 
general  "  views,"  but  "  my  views."  These  opinions 
have  not  been  argued  into  their  heads,  and  history  and 
experience  afford  no  instance  of  their  having  been  ever 
argued  out  of  them.  Solidified  as  they  are  into  muscle 
and  bone,  their  hard  tenacity  of  hold,  impregnable  to 
fhe  syllogism,  would  almost  resist  the  axe  or  the  batter- 
ing-ram. To  change  the  "  views "  of  such  minds  is  a 
task  resembling  the  boring  of  tunnels  or  the  blasting  of 
rocks.  Their  phraseology,  when  its  organic  pith  and 
substance  are  uncorrupted  by  the  schoolmaster,  is,  of 
course,  singularly  close,  compact,  and  vital,  indicating 


24:0  USE    AND   MISUSE    OF    WORDS. 

an  interior  perception  of,  and  familiar  acquaintance  with, 
the  matters  about  which  they  talk.  In  English  litera- 
ture, these  thinkers  and  rhetoricians  of  humble  life  are 
contemptuously  referred  to  as  "  the  vulgar,"  and  young 
students  are  pathetically  adjured  not  to  catch  the  infec- 
tion of  their  speech ;  but  it  seems  to  us  that  they  hint 
the  true  philosophy  of  rhetoric  better  than  Dr.  Camp- 
bell directly  teaches  it ;  for  their  words  are  always 
things,  and  the  aim  of  the  loftiest  creative  thinker  is,  in 
expression,  to  give  solidity  to  spiritual  facts.  Even  in 
the  use  of  tropes  they  evince  a  more  subtile  knowledge 
of  the  vital  processes  of  figurative  expression  than  most 
of  the  poetasters  who  sniff  at  them.  "  That  horse  of 
yours,"  said  a  friend  of  ours  to  a  farmer, "  is  very  hand- 
some." "  Yes,"  was  the  drawling  reply,  "  but  he  is  — 
as  —  slow  —  as  —  cold  molasses."  We  doubt  if  an 
analyst  could  find,  out  of  the  great  poets,  a  better  exam- 
ple than  this  on  which  to  exercise  his  skill  in  giving 
the  genesis  of  an  imaginative  analogy.  The  idea,  as 
Bacon  would  say,  is  thoroughly  "  immersed  in  matter." 
The  authors  who  have  studied  the  modes  of  thinking 
and  expression  characteristic  of  "  the  vulgar,"  have 
always  exercised  a  wide  influence ;  for  in  that  school 
they  learned  to  think  in  the  concrete,  and  to  give  to 
thoughts  the  form  and  significance  of  visible  realities. 
The  reserved  power  always  underlying  the  sparse  speech 


USE   AND   MISUSE    OF   WORDS.  241 

of  ordinary  men,  imparts  tenfold  meaning  and  force  to 
their  words  and  images.  Sir  Edward  Coke,  a  man  of 
prodigious  ability  and  acquirement,  but  still  essentially 
commonplace  in  his  intellect  and  prejudices,  was  once 
goaded  by  rage  and  hatred  into  an  imagination  in  which 
his  whole  massive  nature  seemed  to  emit  itself  in  a 
Titanic  stutter  of  passion.  We  refer,  of  course,  to  his 
calling  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  a  "spider  of  hell,"  —  an 
image  in  which  loathing  became  executive,  and  palpably 
smit  its  object  on  the  cheek.  It  was  from  the  fact  that 
imagination  was  so  small  an  element  in  his  general 
power,  and  required  the  utmost  depth  of  passion  to  be 
pushed  into  prominence,  that  it  acted  so  like  a  bolt 
when  it  did  flame  fiercely  out.  The  image  may  be  a 
small  matter  in  itself,  but  it  becomes  tremendous  when 
we  see  the  whole  roused  might  of  Sir  Edward  Coke 
glare  terribly  through  it.  The  spider,  indeed,  appears 
to  be  a  favorite  symbol  of  ordinary  fancies  to  express 
spite.  Thus  Henry  Fox,  in  a  hot  attack  on  Lord 
Chancellor  Hardwicke,  who  was  supposed  to  have  no 
desire  to  reform  the  many  abuses  of  his  office,  exclaimed  : 
"  Touch  but  a  cobweb  in  Westminster  Hall,  and  the  old 
spider  of  the  Law  is  out  upon  you,  with  all  his  vermin 
at  his  heels."  This  image  makes  the  flesh  creep. 

Common   sense,  as    embodied   in    character,  has   a 
downright   directness   of  expression   often   offensively 
16 


212  USE    AND   MISUSE    OF   WORDS. 

dogmatic,  though  the  dogmatism  is  not  without  justifica- 
tion in  the  evident  certainty  —  the  iron  clutch  —  of  its 
hold  upon  things.  But  in  men  of  coarse  strength  of 
nature,  endowed  with  broad  perceptions  on  low  levels 
of  thought,  this  practical  sagacity  is  apt  to  wax  into 
conceit  with  itself,  to  be  developed  in  connection  with 
pride  and  self-will,  and  gradually  to  degenerate  into  a 
bearish  arrogance  of  self-assertion,  in  which  a  good 
portion  of  its  original  clearness  of  view  is  obscured. 
The  moment  this  divorce  between  force  and  insight 
occurs,  will  is  pampered  at  the  expense  of  understand- 
ing, and  the  result  is  a  wilfulness,  whose  expression  is 
marked  by  an  overbearing  dogmatism,  hateful  to  all 
who  delight  in  the  dominion  of  reason  over  animal 
vigor  and  effrontery.  Men  of  this  stamp  often  preserve 
more  than  an  ordinary  degree  of  intellect ;  but  intellect 
is  still  a  tool  to  be  used,  not  a  torch  to  guide.  Both  in 
literature  and  in  life,  they  are  the  swashbucklers,  bullies, 
and  bravos  of  speech,  unscrupulous,  despotic,  wrong- 
headed,  ambitious  to  conquer  rather  than  anxious  to 
convince,  and  indisposed,  indeed,  to  give  any  reasons 
for  saying  or  doing  a  thing,  so  long  as  they  can  "  bid 
their  will  avouch  it."  They  are  often  very  effective  as 
writers,  orators,  statesmen,  theologians,  from  their  war- 
like attitude  and  tactics,  —  using  words  as  bullets, 
throwing  off  statements  and  arguments  like  successive 


USE    AND    MISUSE    OF    WORDS.  243 

discharges  of  cannon,  and  thoroughly  understanding 
the  art  of  rapidly  concentrating  the  heaviest  mass  of 
invective  on  the  weakest  point  of  resistance.  Lord 
Chancellor  Thurlow  is  a  shining  example  of  the  method 
by  which  opponents  may  be  cowed  or  scattered  by 
abuse,  and  offices  of  trust  and  honor  taken  by  assault. 
By  sheer  strength  of  imperious,  indomitable  impudence, 
,}re  pushed  himself  into  high  station,  and,  what  is  more, 
did  what  he  pleased  after  he  attained  it.  He  was  not 
content  to  rule ;  he  was  unhappy  unless  he  could 
domineer.  During  the  time  that  he  hung,  "  like  a  low, 
black  cloud,"  over  the  House  of  Lords,  the  proudest 
peers  were  abashed  by  the  scowl  of  his  shaggy  brow, 
the  ominous  growl  of  his  voice,  "like  thunder  heard 
remote,"  and  the  impending  lightnings  which  seemed 
ready  to  dart  from  his  eyes  at  the  slightest  touch  of 
provocation.  His  means  of  success  were  immense 
confidence  in  himself,  immense  assumed  contempt  for 
others,  and  the  favor  of  his  Most  Wilful  Majesty, 
George  III.,  who  was  attracted  to  him  by  a  kindred 
spirit.  He  would  have  his  own  way.  He  unhesitat- 
ingly plotted  against  administrations  of  which  he  was 
himself  a  member,  hectored  statesmen  of  his  own  party, 
gave  judgments  in  chancery  without  condescending  to 
state  reasons  for  them,  and  fairly  bullied  his  contempo- 
raries into  the  opinion  that  he  was  a  great  statesman 


241  USE    AND    MISUSE    OF    WORDS. 

and  a  great  jurist.  There  was  a  fascination  in  his 
towering  effrontery.  George  III.  and  his  queen  were 
eminently  moral  people,  yet  Thurlow  was  a  favorite  of 
both,  though  he  openly  defied  moral  restraints.  When 
Chancellor,  he  was  "  keeper  of  the  King's  conscience  " 
and  of  a  mistress,  paraded  his  illegitimate  children  in 
public,  and  swore  more  terribly  than  ever  did  "our 
army  in  Flanders."  At  one  time,  when  the  King  was 
threatened  with  insanity,  and  was  palpably  incompetent 
to  understand  the  acts  which  the  Chancellor  carried  to 
him  for  his  approval,  Thurlow  became  impatient  at  the 
demands  of  his  Majesty  to  have  their  purport  explained 
to  him.  "  It 's  all nonsense,"  said  the  gruff  Chan- 
cellor, "  to  try  to  make  your  Majesty  understand  them, 
and  you  had  better  consent  to  them  at  once."  He 
sometimes  employed  Mr.  Justice  Buller,  a  judge  in 
every  respect  his  superior,  to  sit  for  him  in  the  Court 
of  Chancery,  and  praised  his  decisions  publicly ;  but  on 
its  being  said  to  him  that  it  was  remarkable  that  a 
Common  Law  judge  should  be  so  familiar  with  Equity, 
Thurlow  exclaimed,  "  Equity !  he  knows  no  more  of  it 
than  a  horse ;  but  he  disposes  somehow  of  the  cases, 
and  I  seldom  hear  of  them  again."  When  Mr.  Pitt's 

death  was  announced  to  him,  he  remarked,  "A  

good  hand  at  turning  a  period ! "  This  insolent  as- 
sumption of  superiority  is  stamped  on  all  his  speeches, 


USE   AND    MISUSE   OF   WORDS.  245 

public  and  private ;  but  it  must  be  admitted  that  he 
had  completely  mastered  the  art  of  individualizing  lan- 
guage, and  of  making  words  perform  the  office  of  blows 
and  stabs. 

There  are  many  people  who  cannot  recognize  the 
presence  of  a  powerful  personality,  except  it  be  thus 
exhibited  in  salient  personal  traits.  But  personal  force, 
in  its  healthy  development,  purifies  itself  from  obtrusive 

fr 

individualities  in  proportion  to  the  singleness  and  vigor 
of  its  aim  and  purpose ;  and  in  works  of  simple  state- 
ment and  argumentation  we  often  feel  the  presence  of 
character  as  a  moving  power,  when  it  fails  to  be  visible 
in  obstructive  singularities.  It  is  character  that  states 
and  reasons,  though  character  broadened  into  under- 
standing, and  seemingly  as  impersonal  as  the  facts  and 
principles  it  grasps  and  expounds.  Dr.  Samuel  Clarke, 
John  Stuart  Mill,  Sir  William  Hamilton,  and  Daniel 
Webster  are  instances  in  point.  In  the  language  of 
these  men  we  observe  an  austere  conscientiousness  of 
phrase,  as  if  every  word  had  been  severely  tested  and 
kept  subordinate  to  the  thought  which  it  is  used  to  con- 
vey. The  sober  and  solid  tramp  of  their  style  reflects 
the  movement  of  intellects  that  palpably  respect  the 
relations  and  dimensions  of  things,  and  to  which  exag- 
geration would  be  immorality.  We  should  hesitate  to 
call  them  creative  thinkers,  and  equally  to  place  them 


246  USE    AND    MISUSE    OF    WORDS. 

in  point  of  greatness  below  any  but  creative  thinkers 
of  the  first  class.  It  is  indeed  with  a  sigh  of  regret, 
that  a  critic  who  has  studied  Sir  William  Hamilton  is 
compelled  to  station  him  not  even  abreast  of  Hobbes 
and  Locke. 

In  passing  from  intellectual  character  of  this  testing 
and  reasoning,  but  not  especially  originating,  species  to 
creative  power,  we  do  not  at  first  ascend.  Natures 
comparatively  little  often  exhibit  faculties  which  are 
fine  in  kind,  though  limited  in  degree,  and  exhibit  them 
also  as  centred  in  character.  In  their  expression  there 
is  none  of  the  hardness  which  distinguishes  the  tough 
vitality  and  vigor  of  men  in  whom  understanding  pre- 
dominates. The  little  there  is  in  them  melts,  flows, 
fuses,  shines.  They  can  create  and  combine,  though 
their  creations  and  combinations  be  petty  and  of  small 
account ;  and  they  leave  the  permanent  print  of  their 
natures  in  those  sly  corners  and  crevices  of  the  litera- 
ture of  a  language,  which  the  omnivorous  general  reader 
delights  to  explore.  Colley  Gibber,  for  instance,  is  a 
small  creature  enough,  but  still  an  indissoluble  unit  and 
representative  of  flippant  character,  endowed  with  a 
delightful  little  imagination  exactly  answering  to  the 
demands  of  his  little  nature,  and  fertile  in  little  crea- 
tions and  bright  and  shallow  gossip,  always  meaning 
well  and  never  meaning  much.  Horace  Walpole,  a 


USE    AND    MISUSE    OP   WORDS.  247 

higher  example  of  the  same  flippancy,  built  up, 
through  an  assimilation  of  all  the  frippery  of  literature 
and  all  the  frippery  of  fashionable  life,  a  character  per- 
fect in  its  kind,  and  within  its  sphere  undoubtedly  crea- 
tive. The  affectation  of  his  style  has  its  roots  in  the 
affectation  of  his  nature,  and  it  is  an  admirable  style  for 
him.  The  sarcastic  pertness  of  his  diction,  in  which 
wit  and  observation  tend  to  crystallize  in  words,  and 
become  brittle  as  they  grow  sparkling,  shows  a  nature 
not  so  fluid  as  Gibber's,  and  acting  more  by  starts  and 
flings  of  fanciful  inspiration.  His  wit  is  unmistakably 
original,  sometimes  in  kind.  An  old  and  pious  lady, 
into  whose  hands  some  of  Lord  Rochester's  licentious 
letters  came,  burned  them, — "for  which,"  Walpole 
petulantly  says,  "she  is  now  burning  in  —  heaven." 
Occasionally  a  single  word  does  the  work  of  a  para- 
graph. "  Lady  ,"  he  remarks  in  one  of  his  let- 
ters, " looks  ghastly  and  going" 

Geniality  is  a  finishing  grace  to  intellectual  character, 
and  we  especially  feel  its  sweetness  in  natures  of  great 
reach  and  depth ;  but  in  minds  whose  endowments  are , 
by  no  means  extraordinary,  it  sometimes  amounts  to 
a  weakness.  Leigh  Hunt  is  an  example  of  what  we 
should  call  a  fondling  character,  and  a  great  master 
of  its  verbal  expression.  Language  in  his  hands  is 
the  most  flexible  of  instruments  to  convey  dainty  and 


248  USE   AND   MISUSE   OF   WORDS. 

pleasant  sensations.  His  self-content  is  so  great  that 
it  flows  out  in  content  with  all  the  world.  He  fon- 
dles everything  and  everybody.  Shakespeare,  Spenser, 
Shelley,  Coleridge,  he  dandles  on  his  knee,  as  if  they 
were  babies,  paws  them,  and  would  fill  their  dear  little 
mouths  with  sugared  epithets  of  eulogy.  This  he  seems 
to  think  is  genial  criticism.  Even  divine  things  cannot 
escape  his  all-tolerating  kindliness ;  for,  whatever  sects 
and  churches  may  say,  he  knows  that  the  world  was 
made  after  the  image  of  Leigh  Hunt.  The  Deity  with 
him  is  not  so  much  Infinite  Goodness  as  infinite  good- 
nature, and  we  believe  he  published  a  devotional  book 
to  inculcate  that  doctrine.  He  talks  very  cosily  about 
Dante,  and  appeals  to  the  readers  whom  he  conducts 
through 'the  "Inferno,"  if  they  really  can  believe  that 
such  fine  fellows  as  they  there  behold  in  torments  ought 
to  be  treated  in  that  way.  Throughout  his  writings, 
indeed,  he  seems  to  think  that  the  wax  taper,  which  he 
holds  so  jauntily,  can  light  up  all  the  gloom  and  dark- 
ness of  the  moral  universe.  This  foppery  is  of  a  differ- 
ent kind  from  Walpole's,  and  is  much  more  delightful ; 
but  it  is  still  foppery,  though  the  foppery  of  philan- 
thropy. 

We  have,  doubtless,  said  more  than  enough  respecting 
words  as  media  for  the  transpiration  of  character,  and 
it  would  be  a  waste  of  illustration  to  trace  the  working 


USE    AND   MISUSE    OF   WORDS.  249 

of  the  principle  through  other  forms  of  personality,  such 
as  the  sentimental,  the  Satanic,  the  eccentric,  the  relig- 
ious, and  the  heroic.  In  all  of  these,  however,  language 
is  moulded  into  the  organic  body  of  thought,  and  the 
organisms  stand  out  in  literature  with  the  distinctness 
and  the  diversity  of  organic  forms  in  nature.  The 
words  are  veined,  and  full  of  the  lifeblood  of  the  creative 
individualities  projected  into  them  with  un withholding 
energy.  In  criticising  such  works  we  soon  discover 
that  what  we  at  first  call  faults  of  style  are  in  reality 
faults  of  character.  But  such  individualities  are  more 
or  less  narrow  and  peculiar;  and  it  is  only  when  we 
arrive  at  those  rare  natures,  with  sensibility,  reason, 
fancy,  wit,  humor,  imagination,  all  included  in  the  op- 
erations of  one  mighty,  spiritual  force,  which  we  feel  to 
be  greater  than  one  or  all  of  the  faculties  and  passions, 
that  we  compass  the  full  meaning  of  intellectual  char- 
acter in  apprehending  its  highest  form.  Such  men  — 
Shakespeare,  for  example  —  appear  to  be  impersonal 
simply  because  their  personality  is  so  broad.  They  are 
impersonal  relatively,  not  positively.  Capable  of  dis- 
cerning, interpreting,  representing,  the  actual  and  possi- 
ble peculiarities  of  human  character,  they  seem  to  have 
few  peculiarities  of  their  own.  They  have  no  leading 
idea,  because  they  have  so  many  ideas  ;  no  master  pas- 
sion, because  they  have  so  many  passions ;  no  hobby, 


250  USE    AND    MISUSE    OF    WORDS. 

great  or  little,  sublime  or  mean,  because  they  possess  a 
vital  conception  of  relations,  as  well  as  a  vital  conception 
of  things  and  persons.  But  they  never  really  pass,  as 
creative  minds,  beyond  the  limits  of  their  characters  ; 
for  it  is  always  men  that  create,  not  some  vagrant 
faculty  of  men. 

It  is  sometimes  doubted  if  the  style  of  such  writers 
can  be  taken  as  the  measure  of  their  power  and  variety 
of  power.  Now  there  is  in  the  smallest  individual  in- 
telligence an  abstract  possibility  which  is  never  realized 
in  any  mode  of  expression  while  he  is  in  the  body,  and 
this  limitation  is  especially  felt  when  we  read  the  works 
of  the  greatest  individualized  intelligences.  So  far,  and 
only  so  far,  are  we  inclined  to  concede  that  the  great 
masters  and  creators  of  language  find  in  words  but  a 
partial  expression  of  their  natures.  What  is  directly 
conveyed  in  words  and  images,  according  to  their  literal 
interpretation,  is,  of  course,  inadequate  to  fix  and  em- 
body a  mind  like  Shakespeare's ;  but  then-  the  marvel 
of  Shakespeare's  diction  is  its  immense  suggest! ven ess, 
—  his  power  of  radiating  through  new  verbal  combina- 
tions or  through  single  expressions  a  life  and  meaning 
which  they  do  not  retain  in  their  removal  to  diction- 
aries. When  the  thought  is  so  subtile,  or  the  emotion 
so  evanescent,  or  the  imagination  so  remote,  that  it 
cannot  be  flashed  upon  the  "  inward  eye,"  it  is  hinted 


USE    AND    MISUSE    OF   WORDS.  251 

to  the  inward  ear  by  some  exquisite  variation  of  tone. 
These  irradiations  and  melodies  of  thought  and  feeling 
are  seen  and  heard  only  by  those  who  think  into  the 
words,  but  they  are  nevertheless  there,  whether  per- 
ceived or  not.  An  American  essayist  on  Shakespeare, 
Mr.  Emerson,  in  speaking  of  the  impossibility  of  acting 
or  reciting  his  plays,  refers  to  this  magical  suggestive- 
n.v-s  in  a  sentence  almost  as  remarkable  as  the  thing  it 
describes.  "  The  recitation,"  he  says,  "  begins :  one 
golden  word  leaps  out  immortal  from  all  this  painted 
pedantry,  and  sweetly  torments  us  with  invitations  to  its 
own  inaccessible  homes!"  He  who  has  not  felt  this 
witchery  in  Shakespeare's  style  has  never  read  him. 
He  may  have  looked  at  the  words,  but  has  never 
looked  into  them. 

We  have  been  able,  in  these  hasty  observations 
on  the  use  and  misuse  of  words,  to  touch  upon  only 
a  few  topics  connected  with  our  theme.  There  are 
many  others  that  would  repay  investigation,  which  we 
have  hardly  named,  such  as  the  intimate  connec- 
tion between  clearness  and  freshness  of  expression,  — 
the  sources  of  the  pleasure  we  take  in  style  apart  from 
the  importance  of  the  matter  it  conveys,  —  the  differ- 
ence between  an  author's  expressing  an  idea  to  himself 
and  expressing  it  to  others,  —  the  power  of  words,  as 
wielded  by  a  man  of  genius,  to  create  or  evoke  in 


252  USE   AND   MISUSE   OF   WORDS. 

another  mind  the  thought  or  emotion  they  embody,  — 
the  peculiar  vitality  and  the  amazing  mystical  signifi- 
cance of  language  when  used  as  the  organ  for  express- 
ing the  phenomena  of  rapture  and  ecstasy,  —  and  the 
interior  laws  which  regulate  the  construction  and  move- 
ment of  style,  according  as  the  purpose  is  to  narrate, 
describe,  reason,  or  invent.  But  we  have  not  space  at 
present  to  consider  these  topics  with  the  attention  they 
deserve.  In  the  somewhat  extended  remark-  into 
which  we  have  been  provoked  by  the  publication  of 
Dr.  Roget's  "  Thesaurus,"  we  have  confined  ourselves 
to  a  few  obvious  principles,  and  have  labored  to  show 
the  hopelessness  of  all  attempts  to  make  language  really 
express  anything  finer,  deeper,  higher,  or  more  forcible 
than  what  lives  in  the  mind  and  character  of  the  writer 
who  uses  it.  Especially  in  all  that  relates  to  strength 
of  diction,  we  think  it  will  be  found  that  the  utmost 
affluence  in  energetic  terms  will,  of  itself,  fail  to  impress 
on  style  any  vital  energy  of  soul ;  for  this  energy, 
whether  it  work  like  lightning  or  like  light,  whether  it 
smite  and  blast,  or  illumine  and  invigorate,  ever  comes 
from  the  presence  of  the  man  in  the  words. 


WOEDSWOETH* 


«.  THE  death  of  this  eminent  poet,  after  an  honorable 
and  useful  life,  prolonged  to  eighty  years,  will  doubt- 
less provoke  a  new  conflict  of  opinions  regarding  the 
nature  and  influence  of  his  great  and  peculiar  mind. 
The  universal  feeling  among  all  lovers  of  what  is  deep 
and  delicate  and  genuine  in  poetry  must  be, 

"  That  there  has  passed  away  a  glory  from  the  earth  " ; 
and  not  until  literature  receives  an  original  impulse 
from  a  nature  equally  profound  and  powerful  will  it  be 
called  upon  to  mourn  such  a  departure.  His  death  was 
worthy  of  an  earthly  career  consecrated  by  devout  and 
beautiful  meditations  to  a  life  beyond  life,  —  his  soul, 
so  long  the  serene  guest  of  his  mortal  frame,  meekly 
withdrawing  itself  at  the  end  to  a  world  not  unfamiliar 
to  his  raised  vision  here  below. 

We   confess,   at   the   outset,   to   an    admiration   for 
Wordsworth's  genius  bordering  on  veneration,  but  we 

*  Written  when  the  news  came  of  his  death. 


254  WORDSWORTH. 

trust  that  we  can  speak  of  it  without  substituting 
hyperbole  for  analysis,  without  burying  the  essential 
facts  of  his  mental  constitution  under  a  load  of  pane- 
gyric. It  appears  to  us  that  these  facts  alone  convict 
his  depreciating  critics  of  malice  or  ignorance  ;  that 
the  kind  of  criticism  to  which  he  was  originally  sub- 
jected, and  which  even  now  occasionally  reappears 
with  something  of  the  sting  of  its  old  flippancy,  is 
essentially  superficial  and  untenable,  failing  to  cover 
the  ground  it  pretends  to  occupy,  and  disguising  non- 
sense under  a  garb  of  shrewdness  and  discrimination. 
The  opinion  of  a  man  of  ability  on  subjects  which  he 
understands,  and  on  objects  he  really  discerns,  is  en- 
titled to  respect,  and  we  do  not  deny  that  Jeffrey's 
opinions  on  many  important  matters  are  sound  and 
valuable ;  but,  in  relation  to  Wordsworth,  whom  he 
perversely  misunderstood,  he  appears  presumptuously 
incompetent  and  undiscerning  throughout  his  much 
vaunted  criticisms  ;  in  every  case  missing  the  peculiari- 
ties which  constituted  "Wordsworth's  originality,  and 
satirizing  himself  in  almost  every  sarcasm  he  launched 
at  the  poet.  The  usual  defence  set  up  for  such  a  critic 
is,  that  he  judges  by  the  rules  of  common  sense;  but 
every  poet  who  deserves  the  name  is  to  be  judged  by 
the  common  sense  of  the  creative  imagination,  not  by 
the  common  sense  of  the  practical  understanding ;  and 


WORDSWORTH.  255 

mere  police  of  letters,  we  imagine  that  Wordsworth 
will  readily  assume  his  place  as  the  greatest  of  English 
poets  since  Milton. 

In  claiming  for  him  a  position  in  that  line  of  English 
poets  which  contains  no  other  names  than  those  of 
Chaucer,  Spenser,  Shakespeare,  and  Milton,  we  imply 
that  he  is  not  only  great  as  an  individual  writer,  but 
tli  at  he  is  the  head  and  founder  of  a  new  school  of 
poets ;  that  he  is  the  point  from  which  the  future  his- 
torian of  English  letters  will  consider  the  poetry  of  the 
age ;  that  he  introduced  into  English  literature  new  ele- 
ments, whose  inspiration  has  not  yet  spent  itself,  but 
continues  to  influence  almost  every  poet  of  the  day; 

that 

"  Thither,  as  to  their  fountain,  other  stars 
Repairing,  in  their  golden  urns  draw  light." 

This  fact  can  be  chronologically  proved.  In  the  "  Lines 
on  Revisiting  Tinturn  Abbey,"  written  as  far  back  as 
1798,  and  in  which  we  have  the  key-note  of  Words- 
worth's whole  system  of  viewing  nature  and  man,  we 
perceive  not  only  a  new  element  of  thought  added  to 
English  poetry,  but  an  element  which  appeared  after- 
ward in  Shelley  and  Byron  —  modified,  of  course,  by 
their  individuality  —  and  still  appears,  with  decreasing 
force,  in  Tennyson  and  Browning.  Plato  and  Lord 
Bacon  are  not  more  decidedly  originators  of  new 


256  WORDSWORTH. 

scientific  methods  than  "Wordsworth  is  the  originator 
of  a  new  poetical  method.  Even  if  we  dislike  him, 
and  neglect  his  poetry,  we  cannot  emancipate  our- 
selves from  his  influence,  as  long  as  we  are  thrilled 
by  the  most  magnificent  and  ethereal  passages  in 
Shelley  and  Byron.  We  may  be  offended  at  the 
man,  but  we  cannot  escape  from  his  method,  unless 
our  reading  of  the  poets  stops  with  Goldsmith  and 
Cowper.  •  '  ' 

The  vital  poems  of  Wordsworth  —  those  which  are 
really  inspired  with  his  spirit  and  life,  and  not  mere 
accretions  attached  to  his  works  —  form  a  complete 
whole  pervaded  by  one  living  soul,  and,  amid  all  their 
variety  of  subject,  related  to  one  leading  idea,  namely, 
the  marriage  of  the  soul  of  man  to  the  external  universe, 
whose  "  spousal  hymn  "  the  poet  chants.  They  consti- 
tute together  the  spiritual  body  of  his  mind,  exhibiting 
it  as  it  grew  into  beautiful  and  melodious  form  through 
thirty  years  of  intense  contemplation.  To  a  person 
who  has  studied  his  works  with  sufficient  care  to  obtain 
a  conception  of  the  author's  personality,  every  little 
lyric  is  alive  with  his  spirit,  and  is  organically  con- 
nected with  the  long  narrative  and  didactive  poems. 
This  body  of  verse  is,  we  think,  a  new  creation  in  liter- 
ature, differing  from  others  not  only  in  degree  but  in 
kind ;  an  organism,  having  its  own  interior  laws,  growing 


WORDSWORTH.  25t 

from  one  central  principle,  and  differing  from  Spenser 
and  Milton  as  a  swan  differs  from  an  eagle,  or  a  rose 
from  a  lily. 

We  need  hardly  say  that  the  central  power  and 
principle  of  this  organic  body  of  verse  is  Wordsworth 
himself.  He  is  at  its  heart  and  circumference,  and 
through  all  its  veins  and  arteries,  as  the  vivifying  and 
organizing  force,  —  coloring  everything  with  his  pecu- 
liar individuality,  representing  man  and  nature  through 
the  medium  of  his  own  original  and  originating  genius, 
and  creating,  as  it  were,  a  new  world  of  forms  and 
beings,  idealized  from  hints  given  by  the  actual  appear- 
ances of  things.  This  world  is  not  so  various  as  that 
of  Shakespeare  or  Scott,  nor  so  supernatural  as  that 
of  Milton ;  but  it  is  still  Wordsworth's  world,  a  world 
conceived  by  himself,  and  in  which  he  lived  and  moved 
and  had  his  being.  A  true  criticism  of  his  works, 
therefore,  should  be  a  biography  of  his  mind,  exhibiting 
the  vital  processes  of  its  growth,  and  indicating  the 
necessary  connection  between  its  gradual  interior  de- 
velopment and  the  imaginative  forms  in  which  it  was 
expressed.  This  we  cannot  pretend  to  do,  having 
neither  the  insight  nor  the  materials  for  such  a  task, 
and  we  shall  be  content  with  attempting  a  faint  outline 
of  his  mental  character,  with  especial  reference  to  those 
qualities  which  dwelt  near  the  heart  of  his  being,  and 
17 


258  WORDSWORTH. 

which  seem  to  have  been  woven  into  the  texture  of  his 
mind  at  birth. 

Wordsworth  was  bora  in  April,  1770,  of  parents  suf- 
ficiently rich  to  give  him  the  advantages  of  the  usual 
school  and  collegiate  education  of  English  youth.  He 
early  manifested  a  love  for  study,  but  it  may  be  inferred 
that  his  studies  were  such  as  mostly  ministered  to  the 
imagination,  as  he  displayed,  from  his  earliest  years, 
a  passion  for  poetry,  and  never  seems  to  have  had  a 
thought  of  choosing  a  profession.  At  the  University  of 
Cambridge  he  appears  to  have  read  the  classics  with 
the  divining  eye  and  assimilating  mind  of  a  poet,  and  if 
he  did  not  attain  the  first  position  as  a  classical  scholar, 
he  certainly  drank  in  beyond  all  his  fellows  the  spirit 
of  the  great  writers  of  Greece  and  Rome.  In  a  mind 
so  observing,  studious,  thoughtful,  imaginative,  and  stead- 
fast as  his,  the  power  of  which  consisted  more  in  con- 
centration of  view  than  rapidity  of  movement,  the 
images  of  classical  poetry  must  have  been  firmly  held 
and  lovingly  contemplated ;  and  to  his  collegiate  culture 
we  doubtless  owe  the  exquisite  poems  of  Dion  and 
Laodamia,  the  grand  interpretative,  uplifting  mythologi- 
cal passage  in  The  Excursion,  and  the  general  felicity  of 
the  classical  allusions  and  images  throughout  his  works. 
He  probably  wrote  much  as  well  as  meditated  deeply 
at  college,  but  very  few  of  his  juvenile  pieces  have 


WORDSWORTH.  259 

been  preserved,  and  those  which  are  preserved  seem 
little  more  than  exercises  in  expression.  On  leaving 
college  he  formed  the  determination  of  educating  his 
poetical  faculty  by  a  communion  with  the  forms  of 
nature,  as  others  study  law  and  theology.  He  resided 
for  some  time  in  the  West  of  England,  and  at  about  the 
age  of  twenty  made  the  tour  of  France,  Italy,  Switzer- 
land, and  Germany,  travelling  mostly  on  foot,  diving 
into  forests,  lingering  by  lakes,  penetrating  into  the 
cottages  of  Italian  peasants  and  German  boors,  and 
alternating  the  whole  by  a  residence  in  the  great 
European  cities.  This  seems  to  have  occupied  nearly 
two  years  of  his  life ;  its  immediate,  but  not  its  only 
result,  was  the  publication  of  his  "  Descriptive  Sketches 
in  Verse,"  indicating  accurate  observation  rather  than 
shaping  imagination,  and  undistinguished  by  any  marked 
peculiarities  of  thought  or  diction.  We  next  hear  of 
him  at  Bristol,  the  companion  of  Coleridge  and  Southey, 
and  discussing  with  those  eager  and  daring  spirits  the 
essential  falsehood  of  current  poetry  as  a  representation 
of  nature.  The  sensible  conclusion  of  all  three  was  this : 
that  the  worn-out  epithets  and  images  then  in  vogue  ' 
among  the  rhymers  were  meaningless ;  that  poetry  was 
to  be  sought  in  nature  and  man ;  and  that  the  language 
of  poetry  was  not  a  tinsel  rhetoric,  but  an  impassioned 
utterance  of  thoughts  and  emotions  awakened  by  a 


260  -WORDSWORTH. 

direct  contact  of  the  mind  with  the  objects  it  described. 
Of  these  propositions,  the  last  was  one  of  primary  im- 
portance, and  in  a  mind  so  grave,  deep,  and  contem- 
plative as  Wordsworth's,  with  an  instinctive  ambition 
to  be  one  of  "  Nature's  Privy  Council,"  and  dive  into 
the  secrets  of  those  visible  forms  which  had  ever  thrilled 
his  soul  with  a  vague  and  aching  rapture,  the  mere 
critical  opinion  passed  into  a  motive  and  an  inspira- 
tion. 

"The  Lyrical  Ballads,"  published  in  1798,  and  to 
which  Southey  and  Coleridge  contributed,  were  the  first 
poems  which  indicated  Wordsworth's  peculiar  powers 
and  passions,  giving  the  first  hints  of  his  poetical  phi- 
losophy, and  the  first  startling  shock  to  the  tastes  of 
the  day.  They  were  mostly  written  at  Allfoxden,  near 
the  Bristol  Channel,  in  one  of  the  deepest  solitudes  in 
England,  amid  woods,  glens,  streams,  and  hills.  Here 
Wordsworth  had  retired  with  his  sister ;  and  Coleridge 
was  only  five  miles  distant  at  Stowey.  Cottle  relates 
some  amusing  anecdotes  of  the  ignorance  of  the  country 
people  in  regard  to  them,  and  to  poets  and  lovers  of 
the  picturesque  generally.  Southey,  Coleridge  and  his 
wife,  Lamb,  and  the  two  Wedgewoods,  visited  Words- 
worth in  his  retirement,  and  the  whole  company  used 
to  wander  about  the  woods,  and  by  the  sea,  to  the  great 
wonder  of  all  the  honest  people  they  met.  As  they 


WORDSWORTH.  261 

were  often  out  at  night,  it  was  supposed  they  led  a 
dissolute  life;  and  it  is  said  that  there  are  respectable 
people  in  Bristol  who  believe  now  that  Mrs.  Coleridge 
and  Miss  Wordsworth  were  disreputable  women,  from 
a  remembrance  of  the  scandalous  tattle  circulating  then. 
Cottle  asserts  that  Wordsworth  was  driven  from  the 
place  by  the  suspicions  which  his  habits  provoked, 
being  refused  a  continuance  of  his  lease  of  the  Allfox- 
den  house  by  the  good  man  who  had  the  letting  of  it, 
on  the  ground  that  he  was  a  criminal  in  the  disguise  of 
an  idler.  One  of  the  villagers  said,  "  that  he  had  seen 
him  wander  about  at  night  and  look  rather  strangely  at 
the  moon!  And  then  he  roamed  over  the  hills  like 
a  partridge."  Another  testified  "he  had  heard  him 
mutter,  as  he  walked,  in  some  outlandish  brogue,  that 
nobody  could  understand."  This  last,  we  suppose,  is 
the  rustic  version  of  the  poet's  own  statement,  — 

"  He  murmurs  near  the  running  brooks 
A  music  sweeter  than  their  own." 

Others,  however,  took  a  different  view  of  his  habits,  as 
little  flattering  to  his  morals  as  the  other  view  to  his 
sense.  One  wiseacre  remarked  confidently :  "  I  know 
what  he  is.  We  have  all  met  him  tramping  away 
toward  the  sea.  Would  any  man  in  his  senses  take  all 
that  trouble  to  look  at  a  parcel  of  water  ?  I  think  he 


262  WORDSWORTH. 

carries  on  a  snug  business  in  the  smugglipg  line,  and,  in 
these  journeys,  is  on  the  lookout  for  some  wet  cargo." 
Another,  carrying  out  this  bright  idea,  added,  "  I  know 
he  has  got  a  private  still  in  his  cellar ;  for  I  once  passed 
his  house  at  a  little  better  than  a  hundred  yards'  dis- 
tance, and  I  could  smell  the  spirits  as  plain  as  an  ashen 
fagot  at  Christmas."  But  the  charge  which  probably 
had  the  most  weight  in  those  times  was  the  last.  "  I 
know,"  said  one,  "  that  he  is  surely  a  desperd  French 
Jacobin ;  for  he  is  so  silent  and  dark  that  no  one  ever 
heard  him  say  one  word  about  politics."  The  result  of 
all  these  various  rumors  and  scandals  was  the  removal 
of  Wordsworth  from  the  village.  It  is  curious  that, 
with  such  an  experience  of  English  country-people, 
Wordsworth  should  never  have  looked  at  them  dramati- 
cally, and  represented  them  as  vulgar  and  prejudiced 
human  beings  as  well  as  immortal  souls.  It  proves 
that  humor  did  not  enter  at  all  into  the  constitution  of 
his  nature ;  that  man  interested  him  more  than  men ; 
and  that  his  spiritual  affections,  connecting  humanity 
constantly  with  its  divine  origin,  shed  over  the  simplest 
villager  a  light  and  atmosphere  not  of  earth. 

While  the  ludicrous  tattle  to  which  we  have  referred 
was  sounding  all  around  him,  he  was  meditating  Peter 
Bell  and  the  Lyrical  Ballads,  in  the  depths  of  the 
Allfoxden  woods,  and  consecrating  the  rustics  who 


WORDSWORTH.  263 

were  scandalizing  him.  The  great  Poet  of  the  Poor, 
who  has  made  the  peasant  a  grander  object  of  contem- 
plation than  the  peer,  and  who  saw  through  vulgar 
externals  and  humble  occupations  to  the  inmost  soul  of 
the  man,  had  sufficient  provocations  to  be  the  satirist  of 
those  he  idealized. 

In  these  Lyrical  Ballads,  and  in  the  poems  written  at 
thfc  same  period  of  their  publication,  we  perceive  both 
the  greatness  and  the  limitations  of  Wordsworth,  the 
vital  and  the  mechanical  elements  in  his  poetry.  As 
far  as  his  theory  of  poetic  diction  was  unimaginative,  as 
far  as  its  application  was  wilful,  it  became  a  mere  mat- 
ter of  the  understanding,  productive  of  little  else  than 
shocks  to  the  poetic  sense,  and  indicating  the  perversity 
of  a  powerful  intellect,  pushing  preconceived  theories  to 
the  violation  of  ideal  laws,  rather  than  the  rapt  inspira- 
tion of  the  bard,  flooding  common  words  and  objects 
with  new  life  and  divine  meanings.  It  is  useless  to 
say  that  the  passages  to  which  we  object  would  not 
provoke  a  smile  if  read  in  the  spirit  of  the  author. 
They  are  ludicrous  in  themselves,  and  would  have 
made  the  author  himself  laugh  had  he  possessed  a  mod- 
erate sense  of  the  humorous.  But  the  gravest  objection 
against  them  is,  that  they  do  not  harmonize  with  the 
poems  in  which  they  appear,  —  are  not  vitally  connected 
with  them,  but  stand  as  excrescences  plastered  on  them, 


264  WORDSWORTH. 

—  and  instantly  suggest  the  theorizer  expressing  his 
scorn  of  an  opposite  vice  of  expression,  by  deliberately 
substituting  for  affected  elegance  a  simplicity  just  as 
much  tainted  with  affectation.  Wordsworth's  true  sim- 
plicity, the  simplicity  which  was  the  natural  vehicle  of 
his  grand  and  solemn  thoughts,  the  simplicity  which 
came  from  writing  close  to  the  truth  of  things,  and 
making  the  word  rise  out  of  the  idea  conceived,  cannot 
be  too  much  commended  ;  but  in  respect  to  his  false 
simplicity,  his  simplicity  for  the  sake  of  being  simple, 
we  can  only  say  that  it  has  given  some  point  to  the  sar- 
casm, "  that  Chaucer  writes  like  a  child,  but  Words- 
worth writes  childishly."  *  These  objectionable  pas- 
sages, however,  are  very  few ;  they  stand  apart  from 
his  works  and  apart  from  what  was  essential  in  him ; 
and  they  are  to  be  pardoned,  as  we  pardon  the  occa- 
sional caprices  of  other  great  poets. 

Another  objection  to  the  Lyrical  Ballads,  and  to 
Wordsworth's  poems  generally,  is  an  objection  which 
relates  to  his  noblest  creations.  He  never  appears  to. 
have  thoroughly  realized  that  other  men  were  not 
Wordsworths,  and  accordingly  he  not  infrequently  vio- 
lates the  law  of  expression,  —  which  we  take  to  be  the 
expression  of  a  man  to  others,  not  the  expression  of  a 

*  Thackeray,  insensible  to  his  real  genius,  always  called  him 
"Daddy  Wordsworth." 


WORDSWORTH.  265 

man  to  himself.  He  speaks,  as  it  were,  too  much  to  his 
own  ear,  and  having  associated  certain  words  with  sub- 
tile thoughts  and  moods  peculiar  to  himself,  he  does  not 
seem  aware  that  the  words  may  not  of  themselves  con- 
vey his  meaning  to  minds  differently  constituted,  and 
accustomed  to  take  the  expressions  at  their  lexicon 
value.  In  this  he  differs  from  Coleridge,  whose  words 
and  music  have  more  instantaneous  power  in  evoking 
the  mood  addressed,  and  thread  with  more  force  and 
certainty  all  the  mental  labyrinths  of  other  minds,  and 
act  with  a  tingling  and  inevitable  touch  on  the  finest 
nerves  of  spiritual  perception.  The  Ancient  Mariner 
and  Christobel  almost  create  the  moods  in  which  they 
are  to  be  read,  and  surprise  the  reader  with  a  revela- 
tion of  the  strange  and  preternatural  elements  lying  far 
back  in  his  own  consciousness.  Wordsworth  has  much 
of  this  wondrous  wizard  power,  but  it  operates  with 
less  direct  energy,  and  is  not  felt  in  all  its  witchery 
until  we  have  thought  into  his  mind,  become  enveloped 
in  its  atmosphere,  and  been  initiated  into  the  "  sugges- 
tive sorcery  "  of  his  language.  Then,  it  appears  to  us, 
he  is  even  more  satisfying  than  Coleridge,  moving  as  he 
does  in  the  transcendental  region  of  thought  with  a  calmer 
and  more  assured  step,  and  giving  evidence  of  having 
steadily  gazed  on  those  spiritual  realities  which  Cole- 
ridge seems  to  have  casually  seen  by  flashes  of  light- 


266  WORDSWORTH. 

ning.  His  language  consequently  is  more  temperate, 
as  befits  a  man  observing  objects  familiar  to  his  mind 
by  frequent  contemplation  ;  but,  to  common  readers,  it 
•would  be  more  effective  if  it  had  the  suddenness  and 
startling  energy  coming  from  the  first  bright  vision 
of  supernatural  objects.  As  it  is,  however,  his  style 
proves  that  his  mind  had  grown  up  to  those  heights  of 
contemplation  to  which  the  mind  of  Coleridge  only  oc- 
casionally darted,  under  the  winged  impulses  of  imagi- 
nation ;  and  therefore  Wordsworth  gives  more  serene 
and  permanent  delight,  more  "  sober  certainty  of  waking 
bliss,"  than  Coleridge,  however  much  the  latter  may 
excel  in  instantaneousness  of  effect. 

The  originality  of  the  Lyrical  Ballads  consisted  not 
so  much  in  an  accurate  observation  of  Nature  as  in  an 
absolute  communion  with  her,  and  interpretation  of  the 
spirit  of  her  forms.  They  combine  in  a  remarkable 
degree  ecstasy  with  reflection,  and  are  marvellously 
refined  both  in  their  perception  of  the  life  of  nature  and 
the  subtile  workings  of  human  affections.  Those  elu- 
sive emotions  which  flit  dimly  before  ordinary  imagina- 
tions and  then  instantly  disappear,  Wordsworth  arrests 
and  embodies ;  and  the  remotest  shades  of  feeling  and 
thought,  which  play  on  the  vanishing  edges  of  concep- 
tion, he  connects  with  familiar  objects,  and  brings  home 
to  our  common  contemplations.  In  the  sphere  of  the 


WORDSWORTH.  267 

affections  he  is  confessedly  great.  The  still,  simple, 
searching  pathos  of  "  We  are  Seven  "  ;  the  mysterious, 
tragic  interest  gathered  around  "  The  Thorn  " ;  and  the 
evanescent  touch  of  an  elusive  mood  in  "  The  Anecdote 
for  Fathers,"  indicate  a  vision  into  the  deepest  sources 
of  emotion.  The  poems  entitled,  "  Expostulation  and 

Reply,"   "The  Tables   Turned,"   "Lines   Written   in 

< 
Early   Spring,"  "  To   My  Sister,"  and  several  others, 

referring  to  this  period  of  1798,  evince  many  of  the 
peculiar  qualities  of  his  philosophy,  and  combine  depth 
of  insight  with  a  most  exquisite  simplicity  of  phrase. 
The  following  extracts  contain  hints  of  his  whole  sys- 
tem of  thought,  expressing  that  belief  in  the  life  of 
nature,  and  the  mode  by  which  that  life  is  communi- 
cated to  the  mind,  which  reappear,  variously  modified, 
throughout  his  writings  :  — 

Nor  less  I  deem  that  there  are  Powers 
Which  of  themselves  our  minds  impress ; 

That  we  can  feel  this  mind  of  ours 
In  a  wise  passiveness. 

And  hark  !  how  blithe  the  throstle  sings! 

He,  too,  is  no  mean  preacher  : 
Come  forth  into  the  light  of  things, 

Let  Nature  be  your  teacher. 

She  has  a  world  of  ready  wealth, 
Our  minds  and  hearts  to  bless,  — 


268  WORDSWORTH. 

Spontaneous  wisdom  breathed  by  health, 
Truth  breathed  by  cheerfulness. 

One  impulse  from  a  vernal  wood 

May  teach  you  more  of  man, 
Of  moral  evil  and  of  good 

Than  aU  the  sages  can. 

Sweet  is  the  lore  which  Nature  brings ; 

Our  meddling  intellect 
Misshapes  the  beauteous  forms  of  things,  — 

We  murder  to  dissect. 

Enough  of  Science  and  of  Art ; 

Close  up  those  barren  leaves ; 
Come  forth  and  bring  with  you  a  heart 

That  watches  and  receives. 

I  beard  a  thousand  blended  notes, 
While  in  a  grove  I  sat  reclined, 

In  that  sweet  mood  when  pleasant  thoughts 
Bring  sad  thoughts  to  the  mind. 

Through  primrose  tufts  in  that  sweet  bower, 
The  periwinkle  trailed  its  wreaths ; 

And  '<  is  my  faith  that  every  flower 
Enjoys  the  air  it  breathes. 

There  is  a  blessing  in  the  air 
Which  seems  a  sense  of  joy  to  yield 

To  the  bare  trees,  and  mountains  bare, 
And  grass  in  the  green  field. 

One  moment  now  may  give  us  more 
Than  years  of  toiling  reason : 


WORDSWORTH.      .  269 

Our  minds  shall  drink  at  every  pore 
The  spirit  of  the  season. 

Some  silent  laws  our  hearts  icitt  wake, 

Which  they  shall  long  obey  : 
We  for  the  year  to  come  may  take 

Our  temper  from  to-day. 

But  the  most  remarkable  poem  written  at  this  period 
of  Wordsworth's  life  is  that  on  Tintern  Abbey,  "  Lines 
composed  on  Revisiting  the  Banks  of  the  Wye."  We 
have  here  that  spiritualization  of  nature,  that  mysterious 
sense  of  the  Being  pervading  the  whole  universe  of 
mattter  and  mind,  that  feeling  of  the  vital  connection 
between  all  the  various  forms  and  kinds  of  creation, 
and  that  marriage  of  the  soul  of  man  with  the  visible 
universe,  which  constitute  the  depth  and  the  charm  of 
Wordsworth's  "divine  philosophy."  After  describing 
the  landscape  which  he  now  revisits,  he  proceeds  to 
develop  the  influence  it  has  exerted  on  his  spirit :  — 

These  beauteous  forms, 
Through  a  long  absence,  have  not  been  to  me, 
As  is  a  landscape  to  a  blind  man's  eye  : 
But  oft  in  lonely  rooms,  and  'mid  the  din 
Of  towns  and  cities,  I  have  owed  to  them, 
In  hours  of  weariness,  sensations  sweet, 
Fell  in  the  blood,  and  felt  along  the  heart, 
And  passing  even  into  my  purer  mind 
With  tranquil  restoration  ;  feelings,  too, 
Of  unremembered  pleasure  ;  such,  perhaps, 


270  WORDSWORTH. 

As  have  no  slight  and  trivial  influence 
On  that  best  portion  of  a  good  man's  life, 
His  little  nameless,  unremembered  acts 
Of  kindness  and  of  love.    Nor  less,  I  trust, 
To  them  I  may  have  owed  another  gift 
Of  aspect  more  sublime  ;  that  blessed  mood, 
In  which  the  burthen  of  the  mystery, 
In  which  the  heavy  and  the  weary  weight 
Of  all  this  unintelligible  world, 
Is  lightened  ;  that  serene  and  blessed  mood, 
In  which  the  affections  gently  lead  us  on, 
Until  the  breath  of  this  corporeal  frame, 
And  even  the  motion  of  our  human  blood 
4lmost  suspended,  ice  are  laid  asleep 
In  body,  and  become  a  living  soul; 
While  with  an  eye  made  quiet  by  the  power 
Of  harmony,  and  the  deep  power  of  joy, 
We  see  into  the  life  of  things. 

He  then  proceeds  to  describe  the  passionate  fascina- 
tion which  Nature  exerted  over  his  youth,  and  the 
change  which  had  come  over  him  by  a  deeper  and 
more  thoughtful  communion  with  her  spirit.  When  we 
consider  that  Wordsworth,  at  this  time,  was  only  twenty- 
eight,  and  that  even  the  emotions  described  in  the  first 
part  of  our  extract  had  no  existence  in  contemporary 
poetry,  we  can  form  some  idea  of  his  giant  leap  in 
advance  of  his  age,  as  indicated  by  the  unspeakable 
beauty  and  novelty  of  the  concluding  portion.  The 
reader  will  notice  that  although  the  style  becomes 


WORDSWORTH.  271 

almost  transfigured  by  the  intense  and  brooding  imagi- 
nation which  permeates  it,  the  diction  is  still  as  simple 
as  prose. 

I  cannot  paint 

What  then  I  was.    The  sounding  cataract 
Haunted  me  like  a  passion ;  the  tall  rock, 
The  mountain,  and  the  deep  and  gloomy  wood, 
Their  colors  and  their  forms,  were  then  to  me 
An  appetite,  a  feeling,  and  a  love, 
That  had  no  need  of  a  remoter  charm, 
By  thought  supplied,  nor  any  interest 
Unborrowed  from  the  eye.    That  time  is  past, 
And  all  its  aching  joys  are  now  no  more, 
And  all  its  dizzy  raptures.    Not  for  this 
Faint  I,  nor  mourn,  nor  murmur  ;  other  gifts 
Have  followed;  for  such  loss,  I  would  believe, 
Abundant  recompense.    For  I  have  learned 
To  look  on  nature,  not  as  in  the  hour 
Of  thoughtless  youth ;  but  hearing  oftentimes 
The  still,  sad  music  of  humanity, 
Nor  harsh  nor  grating,  though  of  ample  power 
To  chasten  and  subdue.    And  I  have  felt 
A  presence  that  disturbs  me  with  the  joy 
Of  elevated  thoughts ;  a  sense  sublime 
Of  something  still  more  deeply  interfused, 
Whose  dwelling  is  the  light  of  setting  suns, 
And  the  round  ocean  and  the  living  air, 
And  the  blue  sky,  and  in  the  mind  of  man; 
A  motion  and  a  spirit,  that  impels 
All  living  things,  all  objects  of  all  thought, 
And  rolls  through  all  things.    Therefore  am  I  still 


272  WORDSWORTH. 

A  lover  of  the  meadows  and  the  woods, 
And  mountains  ;  and  of  all  that  we  behold 
From  this  green  earth;  of  all  the  mighty  world 
Of  eye  and  ear —  both  what  they  half  create 
And  what  perceive;  well  pleased  to  recognize 
In  nature  and  the  language  of  the  sense, 
The  anchor  of  my  purest  thoughts,  the  muse, 
The  guide,  the  guardian  of  my  heart,  and  soul 
Of  all  my  moral  being. 

It  is  this  "  sense  sublime  of  something  still  more 
deeply  interfused  "  that  gives  to  a  well-known  passage 
in  the  concluding  portion  of  the  poem  its  particular 
significance. 

Nature  never  did  betray 
The  heart  that  loved  her;  't  is  her  privilege, 
Through  all  the  years  of  this  our  life,  to  lead 
From  joy  to  joy ;  for  she  can  so  inform 
The  mind  that  is  within  us,  so  impress 
With  quietness  and  beauty,  and  so  feed 
With  lofty  thoughts,  that  neither  evil  tongues, 
Rash  judgments,  nor  the  sneers  of  selfish  men, 
Nor  greetings  where  no  kindness  is,  nor  all 
The  dreary  intercourse  of  daily  life, 
Shall- e'er  prevail  against  us,  or  disturb 
Our  cheerful  faith,  that  all  which  we  behold 
Is  full  of  blessings. 

In  Wordsworth's  use  of  the  word  Nature,  it  must 
always  be  borne  in  mind  that  he  means,  to  use  his  own 
phrase,  — 


WORDSWORTH.  273 

The  Original  of  human  art, 
Heaven-prompted  Nature. 

This  poem,  the  seed-thought  of  all  the  poetry  of  the 
first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  enables  us  to  un- 
derstand the  process  by  which  so  peculiar  a  nature  as 
Wordsworth's  grew  to  its  spiritual  stature.  It  was  by 
placing  his  mind  in  direct  contact  with  natural  objects, 
'passively  receiving  their  impressions  in  the  still  hours 
of  contemplation,  and  bringing  his  own  soul  into  such 
sweet  relations  to  the  soul  of  nature  as  to  "  see  into  the 
life  of  things  " ;  or,  as  he  expresses  it,  in  another  con- 
nection, "  his  soul  had  sight "  of  those  spiritual  realities, 
of  which  visible  forms  and  hues  are  but  the  embodiment 
and  symbolical  language.  Nature  to  him  was  therefore 
always  alive,  spiritually  as  well  as  visibly  existing  ;  and 
he  felt  the  correspondence  between  his  own  life  and 
her  life,  from  perceiving  that  one  spirit  penetrated  both. 
Not  only  did  he  perceive  this,  but  he  mastered  the 
secret  alphabet  by  which  man  converses  with  nature, 
and  to  his  soul  she  spoke  an  audible  language.  Indeed, 
his  mind's  ear  was  even  more  acute  than  his  mind's 
eye ;  and  no  poet  has  excelled  him  in  the  subtle  per- 
ception of  the  most  remote  relations  of  tone.  Often, 
when  he  is  on  the  peaks  of  spiritual  contemplation,  he 
hears  voices  when  he  cannot  see  shapes,  and  mutters 
mystically  of  his  whereabouts  in  words  which  suggest 
18 


274:  WORDS-WORTH. 

rather  than  embody  meaning.  He  grew  in  spiritual 
strength  and  height  by  assimilating  the  life  of  nature, 
as  bodies  grow  by  assimilating  her  grosser  elements ; 
and  this  process  was  little  disturbed  by  communion  with 
other  minds,  either  through  books  or  society.  He 
took  nothing  at  second-hand ;  and  his  Nature  is  not  the 
Nature  of  Homer,  or  Dante,  or  Shakespeare,  or  Milton, 
or  Scott,  but  essentially  the  Nature  of  Wordsworth,  the 
Nature  which  he  saw  with  his  own  eyes,  and  shaped 
with  his  own  imagination.  His  humanity  sprang  from 
this  insight,  for  not  until  he  became  impressed  with  the 
spirit  of  Nature,  and  divined  its  perfect  adaptation  to 
nourish  and  elevate  the  human  mind,  did  he  perceive 
the  worth  and  dignity  of  Man.  Then  simple  humanity 
assumed  in  his  mind  a  mysterious  grandeur,  and  humble 
life  was  spiritualized  by  his  consecrating  and  affection- 
ate imagination.  He  might  then  say,  with  something 
of  a  proud  content,  — 

The  moving  accident  is  not  my  trade  ; 

To  freeze  the  blood  I  have  no  ready  arts ; 
'  T  is  my  delight  alone  in  summer  snade, 

To  pipe  a  simple  song  for  thinking  hearts. 

The  passages  in  which  this  thoughtful  humanity  and 
far-sighted  spiritual  vision  appear  in  beautiful  union 
are  too  numerous  for  quotation,  or  even  for  reference. 
We  will  give  but  two,  and  extract  them  as  hints  of  his 
spiritual  biography  and  the  growth  of  his  mind. 


WORDSWORTH.  275 

Love  he  had  found  in  huts  where  poor  men  lie; 

His  daily  teachers  had  been  woods  and  rills, 
The  silence  that  is  in  the  starry  sky, 

The  sleep  that  is  among  the  lonely  hills. 

But  who  is  He  with  modest  looks, 

And  clad  in  homely  russet  brown  ? 
He  murmurs  near  the  running  brooks 

A  music  sweeter  than  their  own. 

He  is  retired  as  noontide  dew, 

Or  fountain  in  a  noonday  grove; 
And  you  must  love  him,  ere  to  you 

He  will  seem  worthy  of  your  love. 

% 
The  outward  shows  of  sky  and  earth, 

Of  hill  and  valley,  he  had  viewed  ; 
And  impulses  of  deeper  birth 
Had  come  to  him  in  solitude. 

In  common  things  that  round  us  lie 
Some  random  truths  he  can  impart,  — 

The  harvest  of  a  quiet  eye 
That  sleeps  and  broods  on  his  own  heart. 

"We  shall  give  but  one  more  extract ;  illustrative  of 
the  moral  wisdom  which  the  poetic  recluse  had  drunk  in 
from  Nature,  and  incorporated  with  his  own  character. 
It  was  written  at  the  age  of  twenty-five. 

If  thou  be  one  whose  heart  the  holy  forms 

Of  young  imagination  have  kept  pure, 

Stranger!  henceforth  be  warned  ;  and  know  that  pride, 

Howe'er  disguised  in  its  own  majesty, 


276  WORDSWORTH. 

Is  littleness  ;  that  he  who  feels  contempt 

For  any  living  thing,  hath  faculties 

Which  he  has  never  used ;  that  thought  with  him 

Is  in  its  infancy.    The  man  whose  eye 

Is  ever  on  himself  doth  look  on  one, 

The  least  of  nature's  works,  one  who  might  move 

The  wise  man  to  that  scorn  which  wisdom  holds 

Unlawful,  ever.     O  be  wiser,  Thou ! 

Instructed  that  true  knowledge  leads  to  love ; 

True  dignity  abides  with  him  alone 

Who,  in  the  silent  hour  of  inward  thought, 

Can  still  suspect,  and  still  revere  himself, 

In  lowliness  of  heart. 

We  have  dwelt  thus  long  on  Wordsworth's  first 
characteristic  publication,  because  it  expresses  so  well 
the  nature  of  his  own  mind,  and  because  it  gave  an 
original  impulse  to  poetical  literature.  These  Lyrical 
Ballads  were  published  in  the  summer  of  1798,  and 
though  they  attracted  no  general  attention  corresponding 
to  their  original  merit,  they  exercised  great  influence 
upon  all  the  young  minds  who  were  afterwards  to  in- 
fluence the  age.  In  September,  1798,  in  company  with 
Coleridge,  he  visited  Germany,  and  on  his  return  he 
settled  at  Grasmere,  in  Westmoreland ;  a  spot  well 
known  to  all  readers  of  his  poetry,  and  where  he  con- 
tinued to  reside  for  fifteen  years.  In  1803  he  married 
a  Miss  Mary  Hutchinson,  of  Penrith.  Neither  was 
wealthy,  their  joint  income  being  but  £100  a  year. 


WORDSWORTH.  277 

Of  his  wife  we  know  little,  except  that  she  was  of  small 
stature  and  gentle  manners,  and  was  loved  by  her  hus- 
band with  that  still,  deep  devotion  characteristic  of  his 
affections.  He  refers  to  her,  in  a  poem  written  in  his 
old  age,  as 

She  who  dwells  with  me,  whom  I  have  loved 
^  With  such  communion,  that  no  place  on  earth 

Can  ever  be  a  solitude  to  me. 

Between  1803  and  1807,  when  a  second  volume  of 
Lyrical  Ballads  was  published,  he  wrote  many  of  the 
most  beautiful  and  sublime  poems  in  his  whole  works. 
To  this  period  belong  "  The  Memorials  of  a  Tour  in 
Scotland"  (1803),  containing  "The  Solitary  Reaper," 
"The  Highland  Girl,"  "Ellen  Irwin,"  "Rob  Roy's 
Grave,"  and  other  exquisite  and  glowing  impersonations, 
—  his  grand  sonnets  dedicated  to  "National  Indepen- 
dence and  Liberty,"  —  "The  Horn  of  Egremont  Castle," 
"  Heart-Leap  Well,"  "  Character  of  a  Happy  "Warrior," 
"  A  Poet's  Epitaph,"  "  Vandracour  and  Julia,"  the 
"  Ode  to  Duty,"  and,  above  all,  the  sublime  "  Ode  on 
the  Intimations  of  Immortality  from  the  Recollections 
of  Childhood,"*  which  appears  not  to  have  been  struck 
off  at  one  heat,  but  to  have  been  composed  at  various 
periods  between  the  years  1803  and  1806.  * 

*  In  the  opinion  of  Mr.  Emerson,  "  the  high-water  mark  which 
the  intellect  has  reached  in  this  age." 


278  WORDSWORTH. 

There  are  no  events,  in  the  common  acceptation  of 
the  term,  in  Wordsworth's  life  after  the  period  of  his 
marriage,  except  the  publication  of  his  various  works, 
and  the  pertinacious  war  waged  against  them  by  the 
influential  critics.  Though  his  means  were  at  first  lim- 
ited, he  soon,  through  the  friendship  of  the  Earl  of  Lons- 
dale,  received  the  appointment  of  Distributor  of  Stamps 
for  the  ^counties  of  Westmoreland  and  Cumberland,  a 
sinecure  office,  the  duties  of  which  were  done  by  clerks, 
but  which  seems  to  have  given  him  an  income  sufficient 
for  his  wants.  In  1809  he  published  a  prose  work  on 
the  "  Convention  of  Cintra,"  which,  though  designed  as 
a  popular  appeal  in  favor  of  the  oppressed  Spaniards, 
\vas  little  read  at  the  time,  and  is  now  forgotten. 
Southey,  whose  mind  was  on  fire  with  sympathy  for  the 
Spanish  cause,  says  of  this  pamphlet,  in  a  letter  to 
Scott :  "  Wordsworth's  pamphlet  will  fail  of  producing 
any  general  effect,  because  the  sentences  are  long  and 
involved ;  and  his  friend,  De  Quincey,  who  corrected 
the  press,  has  rendered  them  more  obscure  by  an 
unsound  system  of  punctuation.  This  fault  will  out- 
weigh all  its  merits.  The  public  never  can  like  any- 
thing which  they  feel  it  difficult  to  understand I 

impute  Wordsworth's  want  of  perspicuity  to  two  causes, 
—  his  admiration  of  Milton's  prose,  and  his  habit  of 
dictating  instead  of  writing :  if  he  were  his  .own  scribe 
his  eye  would  tell  him  where  to  stop." 


WORDSWORTH.  279 

But  the  great  work  to  which  Wordsworth  was  de- 
voting the  best  years  of  his  life,  was  his  long  philosoph- 
ical poem  of  "  The  Recluse,"  designed  to  give  an  account 
of  the  growth  of  his  own  mind,  and  to  develop  all  the 
peculiarities,  poetical,  ethical,  and  religious,  of  his  system 
of  thought.  A  large  portion  of  this  remains  unpublished, 
but  tUe  second  part  was  issued  in  quarto,  in  1814,  under 
the  title  of  "The  Excursion,"  and  was  immediately 
seized  upon  by  all  the  wit-snappers  and  critics  of  the 
old  school,  and  mercilessly  "  probed,  vexed,  and  criti- 
cised." Jeffrey,  who  began  his  celebrated  review  of 
it  in  the  Edinburgh  with  the  sentence,  "  This  will 
never  do,"  was  successful  in  ridiculing  some  of  its  weak 
points,  but  made  the  mistake  of  stigmatizing  its  sub- 
limest  passages  as  "  unintelligible  ravings."  The  choice 
of  a  pedler  as  the  hero  of  a  philosophical  poem,  though 
it  was  based  on  facts  coming  within  the  author's  knowl- 
edge, was  a  violation  of  ideal  laws,  because  it  had  not 
sufficient  general  truth  to  justify  the  selection.  A  pedler 
may  be  a  poet,  moralist,  and  metaphysician,  but  such 
examples  are  for  biography  rather  than  poetry,  and 
indicate  singularity  more  than  originality  in  the  poet 
who  chooses  them.  Allowing  for  this  error,  subtract- 
ing some  puerile  lines,  and  protesting  against  the  ten- 
dency to  diffusion  in  the  style,  "  The  Excursion "  still 
remains  as  a  noble  work,  rich  in  description,  in  narra- 


280  WORDSWORTH. 

live,  in  sentiment,  fancy,  and  imagination,  and  replete 
with  some  of  the  highest  and  rarest  attributes  of  poe- 
try. To  one  who  has  been  an  attentive  reader  of  it, 
grand  and  inspiring  passages  crowd  into  the  memory 

at  the  mere  mention  of  its  title.     It  is,  more  perhaps 

i 

than  any  other  of  Wordsworth's  works,  enveloped  in 
the  atmosphere  of  his  soul,  and  vital  with  his  individual 
life ;  and  in  all  sympathetic  minds,  in  all  minds  formed 
to  feel  its  solemn  thoughts  and  holy  raptures,  it  feeds 

"  A  calm,  a  beautiful,  and  silent  fire." 

"The  Excursion"  was  followed,  in  1815,  by  the 
"White  Doe  of  Rylstone,"  a  narrative  poem,  which 
Jeffrey  said  deserved  the  distinction  of  being  the  worst 
poem  ever  printed  in  a  quarto  volume,  and  which  ap- 
peai's  to  us  one  of  the  very  best.  We  do  not  believe 
the  "  White  Doe "  is  much  read,  and  its  exceeding 
beauty,  its  subtle  grace,  its  profound  significance,  are 
not  perceived  in  a  hasty  perusal.  It  is  instinct  with  the 
most  refined  and  ethereal  imagination,  and  could  have 
risen  from  the  depths  of  no  mind  in  which  moral  beauty 
had  not  been  organized  into  moral  character.  Its  ten- 
derness, tempered  by  "  thoughts  whose  sternness  makes 
them  sweet,"  pierces  into  the  very  core  of  the  heart. 
The  purpose  of  the  poem  is  to  exhibit  suffering  as  a 
purifier  of  character,  and  the  ministry  of  sympathies, 


WORDSWORTH.  281 

"  Aloft  ascending,  and  descending  quite 
Even  unto  inferior  kinds," 

in  allaying  suffering ;  and  this  is  done  by  a  story  suf- 
ficiently interesting  of  itself  to  engage  the  attention, 
apart  from  its  indwelling  soul  of  holiness.  In  the  repre- 
sentation of  the  Nortons  we  have  the  best  specimens 
of  Wordsworth's  power  of  characterization,  a  power 
in  which  he  is  generally  deficient,  but  which  he  here 
exhibits  with  almost  dramatic  force  and  objective- 
ness. 

"  Peter  Bell "  and  "  The  Wagoner,"  which  appeared 
in  1819,  were  executed  in  a  spirit  very  different  from 
that  which  animates  the  "  White  Doe.  "  They  were 
originally  written  to  illustrate  a  system,  and  seem  to 
have  been  published,  at  this  period,  to  furnish  the 
enemies  of  Wordsworth  some  plausible  excuse  for  at- 
tacking his  growing  reputation.  "  Peter  Bell"  was  con- 
ceived and  composed  as  far  back  as  1798,  and  though 
it  exhibits  much  power  and  refinement  of  imagina- 
tion, the  treatment  of  the  story  is  essentially  ludicrous. 
But  still  it  contains  passages  of  description  which  are 
eminently  Wordsworthian,  and  which  the  most  accom- 
plished of  Wordsworth's  defamers  never  equalled. 
With  what  depth,  delicacy,  sweetness,  ana  simplicity 
are  the  following  verses,  for  instance,  conceived  and 
expressed :  — 


282  WORDSWORTH. 

He  roved  among  the  vales  and  streams, 

In  the  green  wood  and  hollow  dell ; 
They  were  his  dwellings  night  and  day,  — 
But  Nature  ne'er  could  find  the  way 

Into  the  heart  of  Peter  BelL 

In  vain,  through  every  changeful  year, 

Did  Nature  lead  him  as  before ; 
A  primrose  ly  the  river's  brim 
A  yellow  primrose  was  to  him. 

And  it  was  nothing  more. 

At  noon,  when  by  the  forest's  edge 

He  lay  beneath  the  branches  high, 
The  soft  blue  sky  did  never  melt 
Into  his  heart ;  he  never  felt 

The  witchery  of  the  soft  blue  sky. 

On  a  fair  prospect  some  have  looked 

And  felt,  a.s  I  have  heard  them  say, 
As  if  the  moving  time  had  been 
A  thing  as  steadfast  as  the  scene 

On  which  they  gazed  themselves  away. 

There  was  a  hardness  in  his  cheek, 

There  was  a  hardness  in  his  eye, 
As  if  the  man  had  fixed  his  face, 
In  many  a  solitary  place, 

Against  the  wind  and  open  sky. 

"  The  Wagoner  "  is  altogether  unworthy  of  Words- 
worth's genius.  It  is  an  attempt  of  a  poet  without 
humor  to  be  gay  and  jocular,  and  very  dismal  gayety  it 


WORDSWORTH.  283 

is.  But  even  this  poem  is  not  to  be  dismissed  without 
a  reference  to  its  one  exquisite  passage,  —  that  in  which 
he  describes  the  obligation  upon  him  to  write  it :  — 

Nor  is  it  I  who  play  the  part, 

But  a  shy  spirit  in  my  heart, 

That  comes  and  goes  —  will  sometimes  leap 

From  hiding-places  ten  years  deep ; 

Or  haunts  me  with  familiar  face, 

Returning,  like  a  ghost  unlaid, 

Until  the  debt  I  owe  be  paid. 

The  next  volume  of  Wordsworth  was  a  series  of 
sonnets,  under  the  general  title  of  "  The  River  Duddon," 
published  in  1820,  and  singularly  pure  in  style  and 
fresh  in  conception.  This  was  followed,  in  1821,  by 
"  Itinerary  Sonnets,"  chronicling  a  journey  to  the  Con- 
tinent ;  "  Ecclesiastical  Sonnets,"  in  1822,  celebrating 
events  and  characters  in  the  history  of  the  English 
church ;  and  "  Yarrow  Revisited,  and  other  Poems,"  in 
1834.  In  old  age  he  still  preserved  his  young  love  for 
Nature,  and  lost  none  of  his  power  of  interpreting  her 
teachings.  In  a  poem  entitled  "  Devotional  Incitements," 
written  at  the  age  of  sixty-two,  and  distinguished  for  the 
delicate  keenness  of  its  insight,  no  less  than  its  lyric 
rapture,  it  will  be  perceived  that  natural  objects  were 
still  visible  and  audible  to  his  heart  and  imagination. 
"  Where,"  he  exclaims,  — 


284  WORDSWORTH. 

Where  will  they  stop,  those  breathing  powers, 

The  spirits  of  the  new-born  flowers  ? 

They  wander  with  the  breeze,  they  wind 

Where'er  the  streams  a  passage  find ; 

Up  from  their  native  ground  they  rise 

In  mute  aerial  harmonies ; 

From  humble  violet —  modest  thyme — 

Exhaled,  the  essential  odors  climb, 

As  if  no  space  below  the  sky 

Their  subtle  flight  could  satisfy : 

Heaven  will  not  tax  our  thoughts  with  pride  — 

If  like  ambition  be  their  guide. 

Roused  by  the  kindliest  of  May-showers, 
The  spirit  quickener  of  the  flowers, 
That  with  moist  virtue  softly  cleaves 
The  buds,  and  freshens  the  young  leaves, 
The  birds  pour  forth  their  souls  in  notes 
Of  rapture  from  a  thousand  throats  — 
Here  checked  by  too  impetuous  haste, 
While  there  the  music  runs  to  waste, 
With  bounty  more  and  more  enlarged 
Till  the  whole  air  is  overcharged. 
Give  ear,  0  man,  to  their  appeal, 
And  thirst  for  no  inferior  zeal, 
Thou,  who  canst  think  as  well  as  feel. 

Alas  !  the  sanctities  combined 

By  art  to  unsensualize  the  mind, 

Decay  and  languish  ;  or,  as  creeds 

And  humors  change,  are  spurned  like  weeds: 

And  priests  are  from  their  altars  thrust ; 

Temples  are  levelled  with  the  dust  j 


WORDSWORTH.        »  285 

And  solemn  rites  and  awful  forms 
Founder  amid  fanatic  storms, 
Yet  evermore,  through  years  renewed 
In  undisturbed  vicissitude, 
Of  seasons  balancing  their  flight 
On  the  swift  wings  of  day  and  night, 
Kind  Nature  keeps  a  heavenly  door 
Wide  open  for  the  scattered  Poor, 
Where  flower-breathed  incense  to  the  skies 
Is  wafted  in  mule  harmonies  ; 
And  ground  fresh  cloven  by  the  plough 
Is  fragrant  with  a  humbler  vow  ; 
Where  birds  and  brooks  from  leafy  dells 
Chime  forth  unwearied  canticles, 
And  vapors  magnify  and  spread 
The  glory  of  the  sun's  bright  head  — 
Still  constant  in  her  worship,  still 
Conforming  to  the  eternal  Will, 
Whether  men  sow  or  reap  the  fields 
Divine  monition  Nature  yields, 
That  not  by  bread  alone  we  live, 
Or  what  a  hand  of  flesh  can  give ; 
That  every  day  should  leave  some  part 
Free  for  a  sabbath  of  the  heart. 

On  the  death  of  Southey,  "Wordsworth  was  appointed 
Poet  Laureate.  The  latter  years  of  his  life  were 
passed  in  undisturbed  serenity,  and  he  appears  to  have 
retained  his  faculties  to  the  last.  His  old  age,  like  his 
youth  and  mature  manhood,  illustrated  the  truth  of  his 
poetic  teachings,  and  proves  that  poetry  had  taught  him 


286  WORDSWORTH. 

the  true  theory  of  life.  One  cannot  contemplate  him 
during  the  last  ten  years  of  his  existence,  without  being 
forcibly  impressed  with  his  own  doctrine  regarding  the 
lover  of  nature :  — 

Thy  thoughts  and  feelings  shall  not  die, 
Nor  leave  thee  when  old  age  is  nigh 

A  melancholy  slave  ; 
But  an  old  age  serene,  and  bright, 
And  lovely  as  a  Lapland  night, 

Shall  lead  thee  to  thy  grave. 

The  predominating  characteristic  of  Wordsworth's 
poetry  is  thoughtfulness,  a  thoughtfulness  in  which  every 
faculty  of  his  mind  and  every  disposition  of  his  heart 
meet  and  mingle ;  and  the  result  is  an  atmosphere  of 
thought,  giving  a  softening  charm  to  all  the  objects  it 
surrounds  and  permeates.  This  atmosphere  is  some- 
times sparkingly  clear,  as  if  the  airs  and  dews  and  sun- 
shine of  a  May  morning  had  found  a  home  in  his  im- 
agination ;  but,  in  his  philosophical  poems,  where  he 
penetrates  into  a  region  of  thought  above  the  ken  of 
ordinary  mortals,  this  atmosphere  is  touched  by  an  ideal 
radiance  which  slightly  obscures  as  well  as  consecrates 
the  objects  seen  through  it,  and  occasionally  it  thickens 
into  mystical  obscurity.  No  person  can  thoroughly 
enjoy  Wordsworth  who  does  not  feel  the  subtle  effect 
of  this  atmosphere  of  thought,  as  it  communicates  an 


WORDSWORTH.  287 

air  of  freshness  and  originality  even  to  the  common- 
places of  his  thinking,  and  apparels  his  loftier  concep- 
tions in  celestial  light,  — 

"  The  gleam, 

The  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land, 
The  consecration  and  the  poet's  dream." 

The  first  and  grandest  exercise,  therefore,  of  his 
imagination  is  the  creation  of  this  harmonizing  atmos- 
phere, enveloping  as  it  does  the  world  of  his  creation 
with  that  peculiar  light  and  air,  indescribable  but  un- 
mistakable, which  enable  us  at  once  to  recognize  and  to 
class  a  poem  by  "Wordsworth.  We  do  not  hesitate  to 
say  that,  in  its  peculiarity,  there  is  nothing  identical 
with  it  in  literature,  —  that  it  constitutes  an  absolutely 
new  kind  of  poetry,  in  the  Platonic  sense  of  the  word 
"  kind."  An  imagination  which  can  thus  fuse  all  the  fac- 
ulties and  emotions  into  one  individuality,  so  that  all  the 
vital  products  of  that  individuality  are  characterized  by 
unity  of  effect,  is  an  imagination  of  the  highest  kind. 
The  next  question  to  be  considered  is  the  variety  which 
this  unity  includes :  for  Shakespeare  himself,  the  most 
comprehensively  creative  of  human  beings,  never  goes 
beyond  the  unity  of  his  individuality,  his  multifarious 
variety  always  answering  to  the  breadth  of  his  person- 
ality. He  is  like  the  banyan-tree  in  the  marvellous 
fertility  of  his  creativeness,  and  the  province  of  human- 


288  WORDSWORTH. 

ity  he  covers ;  but  the  fertility  all  comes  from  one  root 
and  trunk,  and  indicates  simply  the  greatness  of  the 
kind,  as  compared  with  other  kinds  of  trees.  The 
variety  in  the  operation  of  Wordsworth's  imagination 
we  will  consider  first  in  its  emotional,  and  second  in  its 
intellectual,  manifestation,  —  of  course,  using  these  words 
as  terms  of  distinction,  not  of  division,  because  when  we 
employ  the  word  "  imagination  "  we  desire  to  imply  a 
fusion  of  the  whole  nature  of  the  man  into  one  living 
power.  In  the  emotional  operation  of  Wordsworth's 
imagination  we  discern  his  Sentiment.  No  term  has 
been  more  misused  than  this,  its  common  acceptation 
being  a  weak  affectionateness ;  and,  at  best,  it  is  con- 
sidered as  an  instinct  of  the  sensibility,  as  a  simple, 
indivisible  element  of  humanity.  The  truth  is  that 
sentiment  is  a  complex  thing,  the  issue  of  sensibility 
and  imagination ;  and  without  imagination  sentiment  is 
impossible.  We  often  meet  excellent  and  intelligent 
people,  whose  affections  are  warm,  whose  judgments  are 
accurate,  and  whose  lives  are  irreproachable,  but  who 
lack  in  their  religion,  morality,  and  affections  an  elusive 
something  which  is  felt  to  be  the  last  grace  of  character. 
The  solution  of  the  problem  is  found  in  their  want  of 
Sentiment,  —  in  their  want  of  that  attribute  by  winch 
past  scenes  and  events,  and  absent  faces,  and  remote 
spiritual  realities,  affect  the  mind  like  objects  which  are 


WORDSWORTH.  289 

visibly  present.  Now,  without  this  Sentiment  no  man 
can  be  a  poet,  either  in  feelirfg  or  faculty  ;  and  Words- 
worth has  it  in  a  transcendent  degree.  In  him  it  is 
revealed,  not  only  in  his  idealizing  whatever  in  nature 
or  life  had  passed  into  his  memory,  but  in  his  religious 
feeling  and  in  his  creative  art.  Scenes  which  he  had 
viewed  years  before,  he  tells  us,  still 

Flash  upon  that  inward  eye, 
Which  is  the  bliss  of  solitude. 

Thus  Sentiment  is  that  operation  of  imagination  which 
recalls,  in  a  rnore  vivid  light,  things  absent  from  the 
bodily  eye,  and  makes  them  act  upon  the  will  with 
more  force  and  inspiration  than  they  originally  exerted 
in  their  first  passionate  or  thoughtful  perception ;  and 
trom  its  power  of  extracting  the  essence  and  height- 
ening the  beauty  of  what  has  passed  away  from  the 
senses  and  passed  into  memory,  it  gives  the  impulse 
which  sends  the  creative  imagination  far  beyond  the 
boundaries  of  actual  life  into  the  regions  of  the  ideal,  to 
see  what  is  most  beautiful  here 

Imaged  there 
In  happier  beauty;  more  pellucid  streams, 

An  ampler  ether,  a  diviner  air, 
And  fields  invested  with  purpureal  gleams, 
Climes,  which  the  sun,  who  sheds  the  brightest  day 
Earth  knows,  is  all  unwoi-ihy  to  survey. 
19 


290  WOBDSWORTH 

It  is  needless  to  adduce  passages  to  prove  the  depth 
and  delicacy  of  Wordsworth's  sentiment,  sanctifying  as 
it  does. natural  objects  and  the  humblest  life,  and  lend- 
ing to  his  religious  faith  a  mysterious,  ineffable  beauty 
and  holiness.  In  our  view  of  the  quality  it  must 
necessarily  be  the  limitation  of  a  poet's  creativeness, 
for  the  imagination  cannot  represent  or  create  objects 
to  which  it  does  not  tend  by  a  sentiment ;  and  Words- 
worth, while  he  has  a  sentiment  for  visible  nature,  a 
religious  sentiment,  a  sentiment  of  humanity,  is  still 
confined  to  the  serious  side  of  things,  and  has  no  senti- 
ment of  humor.  If  he  had  humor  as  a  sentiment,  he, 
dowered  as  he  is  with  imagination,  would  have  it  as  a 
creative  faculty,  for  humor  is  simply  the  imagination 
inspired  by  the  sentiment  of  mirth. 

Let  us  now  survey  the  power  and  scope  of  Words- 
worth's imagination,  considered  in  its  intellectual  man- 
ifestation. Here  nothing  bounds  its  activity  but  its 
sentiments.  It  is  descriptive,  pictorial,  reflective,  shap- 
ing, creative,  and  ecstatic ;  it  can  body  forth  abstract 
ideas  in  sensible  imagery ;  it  can  organize,  as  in  the 
"  White  Doe,"  a  whole  poem  around  one  central  idea  ; 
it  can  make  audible  in  the  melody  of  words  shades  of 
feeling  and  thought  which  elude  the  grasp  of  imagery  ; 
it  can  fuse  and  diffuse  itself  at  pleasure,  animating,  col- 
oring, vitalizing  everything  it  touches.  In  description 


WORDSWORTH.  291 

it  approaches  near  absolute  perfection,  giving  not  only 
the  scene  as  it  lies  upon  the  clear  mirror  of  the  per- 
ceptive imagination,  but  representing  it  in  its  life  and 
motion  as  well  as  form.  The  following,  from  "  The 
Night  Piece,"  is  one  out  of  a  multitude  of  instances  :  — 

He  looks  up  —  the  clouds  are  split 
Asunder  —  and  above  his  head  he  sees 
The  clear  Moon,  and  the  glory  of  the  heavens. 
There,  in  a  black  blue  vault  she  sails  along, 
Followed  by  multitudes  of  stars,  that,  small 
And  sharp  and  bright,  along  the  dark  abyss 
Drive  as  she  drives. 

In  the  description  of  the  appearance  of  the  "  White 
Doe,"  we  have  not  only  form,  hue,  and  motion,  but  the 
feeling  of  wonder  that  the  fair  creature  excites,  and 
the  rhythm  which  musically  expresses  the  supernatural 
character  of  the  visitant,  —  all  embodied  in  one  vivid 
picture :  — 

The  only  voice  that  you  can  hear 

Is  ihe  river  murmuring  near. 

—  When  soft  !  —  the  dusky  trees  between, 

And  down  the  path  through  the  open  green, 

Where  is  no  living  thing  to  be  seen; 

And  through  yon  gateway,  where  is  found, 

Beneath  the  arch  with  ivy  bound, 

Free  entrance  to  the  church-yard  ground  — 

Comes  gliding  in  with  lovely  gltam, 

Comes  gliding  in  serene  and  slow, 


292  WORDSWORTH. 

Soft  and  silent  as  a  dream, 

A  solitary  Doe  ! 

White  she  is  as  lily  of  June, 

And  beauteous  as  the  silver  moon 

When  out  of  sight  the  clouds  are  driven 

And  she  is  left  alone  in  heaven ; 

Or  like  a  ship,  some  gentle  duy, 

In  sunshine  sailing  far  away, 

A  glittering  ship  that  hath  the  plain 

Of  ocean  for  her  own  domain. 

In  the  following  we  have  a  mental  description,  so 
subtle  and  so  sweet  as  to  make  the  "  sense  of  satisfac- 
tion ache  "  with  its  felicity  :  — 

And  she  has  smiles  to  earth  unknown, 
Smiles  that,  with  motion  of  their  own, 

Do  spread  and  sink  and  rise; 
That  come  and  go,  with  endless  play, 
And  ever  as  they  pass  away, 

Are  hidden  in  her  eyes. 

This  is  from  the  little  poem  to  "  Louisa."  It  is  curi- 
ous that  Wordsworth,  in  the  octavo  edition  of  his  works, 
published  when  he  was  seventy-seven  years  old,  omits 
this  stanza.  It  was  so  refined  that  he  had  probably 
lost  the  power  to  perceive  its  delicate  beauty,  and  dis- 
missed it  as  meaningless. 

In  describing  Nature,  as  connected  with,  and  em- 
bodied in  human  thoughts  and  sentiments,  Words- 
worth's descriptive  power  rises  with  the  complexity  of 


WORDSWORTH.  293 

the  theme.     Thus,  in  the  poem  of  Ruth,  we  have  an 
example  of  the  perversion  of  her  energizing  power:— 

The  wind,  the  tempest  roaring  high, 
The  tumult  of  a  tropic  sky, 

Might  well  be  dangerous  food 
For  him,  a  youth  to  whom  was  given 
So  much  of  earth  —  so  much  of  heaven, 

And  such  impetuous  blood. 

Whatever  in  those  climes  he  found 
Irregular  in  sight  or  sound, 

Did  to  his  mind  impart 
A  kindred  impulse,  seemed  allied 
To  his  own  powers,  and  justified 

The  workings  of  his  heart. 

Nor  less,  to  feed  voluptuous  thought, 
The  beauteous  forms  of  nature  wrought, 

Fair  trees  and  gorgeous  flowers ; 
The  breezes  their  own  languor  lent; 
The  stars  had  feelings,  which  they  sent 

Into  those  favored  bowers. 

In  another  poem,  we  have  an  opposite  and  purer 
representation  of  Nature's  vital  work,  in  an  ideal  im- 
personation which  has  nothing  like  it  in  the  lan- 
guage :  — 

Three  years  she  grew  in  sun  and  shower, 
Then  Nature  said,  a  lovelier  flower 

On  earth  was  never  sown ; 
This  child  I  to  myself  will  take ; 


294  WORDSWORTH. 

She  shall  be  mine,  and  I  will  make 
A  lady  of  my  own. 

Myself  will  to  my  darling  be 

th  law  and  impulse :  and  with  me 

The  girl  in  rock  and  plain, 
In  earth  and  heaven,  in  glade  and  bower, 
Shall  feel  an  overseeing  power 

To  kindle  or  restrain. 

She  shall  be  sportive  as  the  fawn, 
That  wild  with  glee  across  the  lawn, 

Or  up  the  mountain  springs ; 

nd  hers  shall  be  the  breathing  balm, 

id  hers  the  silence  and  the  calm 

Of  mute  insensate  things. 

The  floating  clouds  their  state  shall  lend 
To  her;  for  her  the  willow  bend; 

Nor  shall  she  fail  to  see 
Even  in  the  motions  of  the  Storm, 
Grace  that  shall  mould  the  maiden's  form 

By  silent  sympathy. 

The  stars  of  midnight  shall  be  dear 
To  her;  and  she  shall  lean  her  ear 

In  many  a  secret  place 
Where  rivulets  dance  their  wayward  round, 
And  beauty  born  of  murmuring  sound 

Shall  pass  into  her  face. 

But  the  most  common  exercise  of  Wordsworth's  im- 
agination is  what  we  may  call  its  meditative  action,  — 


WORDSWORTH.  295 

its  still,  calm,  searching  insight  into  spiritual  truth,  and 
into  the  spirit  of  Nature.  In  these,  analysis  and  re- 
flection become  imaginative,  and  the  "more  than  rea- 
soning mind  "  of  the  poet  overleaps  the  boundaries  of 
positive  knowledge,  and,  steadying  itself  on  the  vanish- 
ing points  of  human  intelligence,  scans  the  "  life  of 
things."  In  the  poems  in  which  meditation  predomi- 
nates, there  is  a  beautiful  union  of  tender  feeling  with 
austere  principles,  and  this  austerity  prevents  his  ten- 
derness from  ever  becoming  morbid.  As  his  meditative 
poems  more  especially  relate  to  practice,  and  contain 
his  theory  of  life,  they  grow  upon  a  studious  reader's 
mind  with  each  new  perusal.  In  them  the  Christian 
virtues  and  graces  are  represented  in  something  of  their 
own  celestial  beauty  and  power,  and  the  poet's  "  vision 
and  faculty  divine "  are  tasked  to  the  utmost  in  giving 
them  vivid  and  melodious  expression.  He  is  not,  in 
this  meditative  mood,  a  mere  moralizing  dreamer,  a 
vague  and  puerile  rhapsodist,  as  some  have  maliciously 
asserted,  but  a  true  poetic  philosopher,  whose  wisdom 
is  alive  with  the  throbs  of  holy  passion  ;  and 

Beauty  —  a  living  Presence  of  the  earth  — 
Surpassing  the  most  fair  ideal  Forms 
Which  craft  of  delicate  spirits  hath  composed 
From  earth's  materials  —  waits  upon  his  steps; 
Pitches  her  tents  before  him  as  he  moves, 
An  hourly  neighbor. 


296  WORDSWORTH. 

* 

But  though  these  poems  are  essentially  meditative 
in  spirit,  they  are  continually  verging  on  two  forms  of 
the  highest  poetic  expression,  abstract  imagination  and 
ecstasy ;  and  the  clear,  serene,  intense  vision  which  is 
their  ordinary  characteristic,  is  the  appropriate  mood 
out  of  which  such  forms  of  imagination  naturally  pro- 
ceed. Let  us  first  give  a  specimen  of  the  creativeness 
of  his  imagination  in  its  calmly  contemplative  mood, 
and  we  will  select  one  of  his  many  hundred  sonnets :  — 

Tranquillity  !  the  sovereign  aim  wert  thou 

In  heathen  schools  of  philosophic  lore; 

Heart-stricken  by  stern  destiny  of  yore 
The  Tragic  Muse  thee  served  with  thoughtful  vow; 
And  what  of  hope  Elysium  could  allow 

Was  fondly  seized  by  Sculpture  to  restore 

Peace  to  the  Mourner.     But  when  He  who  wore 
The  crown  of  thorns  around  his  bleeding  brow 

Warmed  our  sad  being  with  celestial  light, 
Then  Arts,  which  still  had  drawn  a  softening  grace 

From  shadowy  fountains  of  the  Infinite, 
Communed  with  that  Idea  face  to  face : 
And  move  around  it  now  as  planets  run, 
Each  in  its  orbit  round  the  central  sun. 

We  will  not  stop  to  comment  on  the  wealth  of  thought 
contained  in  this  sonnet,  or  the  lingering  suggestiveness 
of  that  wonderful  line,  — 

"  Warmed  our  sad  being  with  celestial  light," 


WORDSWORTH.  297 

but  proceed  to  give  another  example,  fragrant  with  the 
deepest  spirit  of  meditation  :  — 

More  sweet  than  odors  oaught  by  him  who  sails 

Near  spicy  shores  of  Araby  the  blest, 

A  thousand  times  more  exquisitely  sweet, 

The  freight  of  holy  feeling  which  we  meet 

In  thoughtful  moments,  wafted  by  the  gales 

From  fields  where  good  men  walk,  and  bowers  wherein  they  rest. 

The  following  sonnet  may  be  commended  to  warriors 
and  statesmen,  as  containing  a  wisdom  as  practical  in 
its  application  as  it  is  lofty  in  its  conception :  — 

I  grieved  for  Bonaparte"  with  a  vain 

And  an  unthinking  grief!    The  tenderest  mood 

Of  that  man's  mind  —  what  can  it  be  ?  What  food 
Fed  his  first  hopes  ?  What  knowledge  could  he  gain  ? 
'T  is  not  in  battles  that  from  youth  we  train 

The  Governor  who  must  be  wise  and  good, 
And  temper  with  the  sternness  of  the  brain 

Thoughts  motherly  and  meek  as  womanhood. 

Wisdom  doth  live  with  children  round  her  knees; 
Books,  leisure,  perfect  freedom,  and  the  talk 
Man  holds  with  week-day  man  in  the  hourly  walk 

Of  the  mind's  business;  these  are  the  degrees 
By  which  true  sway  doth  mount;  this  is  the  stalk 

True  Power  doth  grow  on ;  and  her  rights  are  these. 

We  will  now  extract  a  magnificent  example  of  ab- 
'stract  imagination,  growing  out  of  the  meditative  imagi- 
nation, and  penetrated  by  it.  It  is  the  "  Thought  of  a 


298  WORDSWORTH. 

Briton  on  the  Subjugation  of  Switzerland";  the  "two 
voices  "  are  England  and  Switzerland. 

Two  Voices  are  there ;  one  is  of  the  sea, 
One  of  the  mountains ;  each  a  mighty  Voice : 
In  both  from  age  to  age  thou  didst  rejoice, 

They  were  thy  chosen  music,  Liberty ! 

There  came  a  Tyrant,  and  with  holy  glee 
Thou  fought'st  against  him;  but  hast  vainly  striven: 
Thou  from  thy  Alpine  holds  at  length  art  driven, 

Where  not  a  torrent  murmurs,  heard  by  thee 
Of  one  deep  bliss  thine  ear  hath  been  bereft: 
Then  cleave,  0  cleave  to  that  which  still  is  left; 

For,  high-souled  Maid,  what  sorrow  would  it  be 
That  mountain  Floods  should  thunder  as  before, 
And  Ocean  bellow  from  his  rocky  shore, 

And  neither  awful  Voice  be  heard  by  thee ! 

Of  the  ecstatic  movement  of  Wordsworth's  imagina- 
tion, we  might  extract  numberless  instances,  rushing  up, 
as  it  does,  from  the  level  of  his  meditations,  throughout 
his  poetry.  Take  the  following,  from  the  "Ode  to 
Duty  " :  — 

Stern  Lawgiver !  yet  thon  dost  wear 

The  Godhead's  most  benignant  grace ; 
Nor  know  we  anything  so  fair 

As  is  the  smile  upon  thy  face ; 
Flowers  laugh  before  thee  on  their  beds, 
And  fragrance  in  thy  footing  treads : 
Thou  dost  preserve  the  stars  from  wrong ; 
And  the  most  ancient  heavens  through  thee  arefretk  and  strong. 


WORDSWORTH.  299 

In  a  descriptive  poem  called  "  The  Gypsies,"  there  is 
a  very  striking  instance  of  rapture  immediately  succeed- 
ing calmness :  — 

The  weary  sun  betook  himself  to  rest ; 
Then  issued  Vesper  from  the  fulgent  west, 
Outshining  like  a  risible  God 
The  glorious  path  in  which  he  trod. 

Again,  observe  how  the  imagination  kindles  and 
melts  into  rapturous  idealization,  and  impetuously  dei- 
fies the  object  of  its  sentiment,  in  the  following  short 
reference  to  the  death  of  Coleridge :  — 

Nor  has  the  rolling  year  twice  measured, 
From  sign  to  sign,  its  steadfast  course, 

Since  every  mortal  power  of  Coleridge 
Was  frozen  at  its  marvellous  source ; 

The  ''rapt  One  of  the  godlike  forehead, 

The  heaven-eyed  creature. 

In  the  sonnet  which  we  now  extract  we  have  a 
specimen  of  that  still  ecstasy,  so  calm  and  so  intense, 
in  which  Wordsworth  stands  almost  alone  among  modern 

poets. 

A  fairer  face  of  evening  cannot  be ; 
The  holy  time  is  quiet  as  a  nun 
Breathless  with  adoration;  the  broad  sun 

Is  sinking  down  in  its  tranquillity ; 

The  gentleness  of  heaven  broods  o'er  the  sea  : 
Listen  !  the  mighty  being  is  awake, 
And  doth  with  his  eternal  motion  make 


300  WORDSWORTH. 

A  sound  like  thunder  —  everlastingly. 

Dear  child  !  dear  girl  !  that  walkest  with  me  here, 
If  thou  appear'st  untouched  by  solemn  thought, 
Thy  nature  is  not  therefore  less  divine : 

Thou  liest  in  Abraham's  bosom  all  the  year; 
And  worship'st  at  the  temple's  inner  shrine, 
God  being  with  thee  when  we  know  it  not. 

It  is,  however,  in  the  sublime  "  Ode  on  the  Intima- 
tions of  Immortality  from  the  Recollections  of  Child- 
hood," that  we  best  perceive  the  power  of  Wordsworth's 
imagination  in  all  the  various  modes  of  its  expression 
—  descriptive,  analytic,  meditative,  interpretative,  ab- 
stract, and  ecstatic  ;  and  in  this  ode  each  of  these  modes 
helps  the  other;  the  grand  choral  harmonies  of  the 
rapturous  upward  movement  seeming  to  be  born  out 
of  the  intense  contemplation,  that  hovers  dizzily  over 
the  outmost  bounds  of  human  conception,  to  scrutinize, 
in  the  dim  dawn  of  consciousness, 

Those  first  affections, 
Those  shadowy  recollections, 
Which  be  they  what  they  may, 
Are  yet  the  fountain  light  of  all  our  day, 
Are  yet  a  master  light  of  all  our  seeing. 

It  is  from  these  that  we  have  ecstasy  almost  as  a 
logical  conclusion ;  for 

Hence  in  a  season  of  calm  weather, 
Though  inland  far  we  be, 


WORDSWORTH.  301 

Our  souls  have  sight  of  that  immortal  sea 

Which  brought  us  hither, 

Can  in  a  moment  travel  thither, 
And  see  the  children  sport  upon  the  shore, 
And  hear  the  mighty  waters  rolling  evermore. 

We  have  no  space  to  particularize  the  felicity  of 
Wordsworth's  muse  in  dealing  with  the  affections,  or 
the  depth  and  power  of  his  pathos.  Before  leaving  the 
subject  of  his  genius,  however,  we  cannot  withhold  a 
reference  to  his  "  Ode  on  the  Power  of  Sound,"  which 
appears  to  be  little  known  even  to  readers  of  the  poet, 
though  in  the  thronging  abundance  of  its  ideas  and 
images,  in  the  exquisite  variety  of  its  music,  and  in  the 
soul  of  imagination  which  animates  it  throughout,  it 
yields  the  palm  to  no  ode  in  the  language. 

Wordsworth  is  most  assuredly  not  a  popular  poet  in 
the  sense  in  which  Moore  and  Byron  are  popular ;  and 
he  probably  never  will  be  so  among  those  readers  who 
do  not  distinguish  between  being  passionate  and  being 
impassioned,  and  who  prefer  the  strength  of  convulsion 
to  the  strength  of  repose  ;  readers  who  will  attend  only 
to  what  stirs  and  startles  the  sensibility,  who  read 
poetry  not  for  its  nourishing  but  its  inflaming  qualities, 
and  who  look  upon  poetic  fire  as  properly  consuming 
the  mind  it  animates.  Wordsworth  is  not  for  them, 
except  they  go  to  him  as  a  spiritual  physician,  in  search 


302  WORDSWORTH. 

of  "balm  for  hurt  minds."  Placed  in  a  period  of  time 
wheif  great  passions  in  the  heart  generated  monstrous 
paradoxes  in  the  brain,  he  clung  to  those  simple  but 
essential  elements  of  human  nature  on  which  true  power 
and  true  elevation  must  rest;  and,  while  all  around 
him  sounded  the  whine  of  sentimentality  and  the  hiss 
of  Satanic  pride,  his  mission,  like  that  of  his  own  beau- 
tiful blue  streamlet,  the  Duddon,  was  "  to  heal  and 
cleanse,  not  madden  and  pollute."  His  rich  and  radiant 
imagination  cast  its  consecrating  and  protecting  light 
on  all  those  dear  immunities  of  humanity,  which  others 
were  seeking  to  discard  for  the  delusions  of  haughty 
error,  or  the  fancies  of  ripe  sensations.  Accordingly, 
though  many  other  poets  of  the  time  have  a  fiercer  or 
fonder  charm  for  young  and  unrestrained  minds,  he  alone 
grows  upon  and  grows  into  the  intellect,  and  "  hangs 
upon  the  beatings  of  the  heart,"  as  the  soul  advances  in 
age  and  reflection;  for  there  is  a  rich  substance  of 
spiritual  thought  in  his  poetry  to  meet  the  wants  of 
actual  life  —  consolations  for  sorrow,  help  for  infirmity, 
sympathy  for  bereavement,  a  holy  gleam  of  awful 
splendor  to  irradiate  the  dark  fear  of  death ;  a  poetry, 
indeed,  which  purifies  as  well  as  pleases,  and  penetrates 
into  the  vitalities  of  our  being  as  wisdom  no  less  than 
loveliness. 


BETANT. 


THE  name  of  Bryant  cannot  be  mentioned  by  any 
friend  to  American  letters  without  respect  as  well  as 
admiration.  The  instinctive  feeling  of  the  critic  is  to 
celebrate  his  positive  qualities,  rather  than  to  indicate 
his  limitations,  or  discuss  his  claims  to  be  considered 
the  greatest  of  American  poets.  A  good  portion  of  the 
jnen  of  the  present  generation  read  his  most  character- 
istic poems  when  they  were  boys,  and  object  to  any 
attempt  to  have  their  "  pleasures  of  memory  "  disturbed. 
«  The  Ages,"  «  Thanatopsis,"  "  Green  Eiver,"  "  Monu- 
ment Mountain,"  are  so  blended  with  their  most  cher- 
ished sentiments  and  principles,  and  their  power  to 
purify  and  tranquillize  the  mind  has  been  subjected  to 
such  tests  of  experience,  that  an  interpretative  criticism 
is  slighted  as  needless,  and  a  captious  criticism  is 
resented  as  impertinent. 

The  hold  that  Bryant  thus  has  on  the  profoundest 
feelings  of  so  large  a  portion  of  his  countrymen  is  to  be 
referred  to  the  genuineness,  delicacy,  depth,  and  purity 


304  BRYANT. 

of  his  sentiment.  A  few  other  American  poets  may 
exfcel  him  in  affluence  of  imagery  and  variety  of  tone 
and  subject,  but  probably  none  is  so  essentially  poetical 
in  nature.  He  is  so  genuine  that  he  testifies  to  nothing, 
in  scenery  or  human  life,  of  which  he  has  not  had  a 
direct  personal  consciousness.  He  follows  the  primitive 
bias  of  his  nature  rather  than  the  caprices  of  fancy. 
His  sincerity  is  the  sincerity  of  character,  and  not 
merely  the  sincerity  of  a  swift  imagination,  that  believes 
only  while  it  is  creating.  He  does  not  appear  to  have 
the  capacity  to  assume  various  points  of  view,  to  project 
himself  into  forms  of  being  different  from  his  own,  to 
follow  any  inspiration  other  than  that  which  springs  up 
in  his  own  individual  heart.  As  a  poet,  his  nature  is^ 
not  broad,  sensitive,  and  genial,  but  intense,  serious, 
and  deep ;  and  we  should  suppose  that  his  sensibility, 
pure  and  earnest  as  it  is,  within  the  bounds  of  his  own 
individual  emotions,  would  cool  from  sympathy  into 
antipathy,  when  exercised  on  objects  beyond  its  self- 
limited  range.  The  charge  of  coldness,  which  is  some- 
times brought  against  him,  must  have  reference  to  the 
limitation,  not  the  force  of  his  sympathies.  The  fire  in 
his  characteristic  poems,  though  it  may  not  roar  and 
redden  in  a  kind  of  conflagation  of  the  passions,  has  a 
pure,  intense,  white  heat,  indicating  the  steady  glow  of 
feeling,  which  has  fused  together  all  the  faculties  of  the 


BRYANT.  305 

man.  His  passion  would  appear  to  have  more  force  if 
it  were  less  purified  from  the  recklessness  of  impulse 
and  the  taint  and  stain  of  appetite. 

To  this  singular  purity  and  depth  of  sentiment,  he 
adds  a  corresponding  simplicity,  closeness,  clearness,  and 
beauty  of  expression.  In  language,  indeed,  he  is  so 
great  an  artist  that  no  general  terms  can  do  justice  to 
his  felicity.  The  very  atmosphere  of  his  sentiment,  the 
subtlest  tone  of  his  thought,  the  most  refined  modifica- 
tions which  feeling  and  reflection  receive  from  individ- 
uality, are  all  tranfused  into  his  style  with  unobtrusive 
ease.  His  style  is  literally  himself.  It  has  the  form 
and  follows  the  movement  of  his  nature,  and  is  shaped 
into  the  expression  of  the  exact  mood,  sentiment,  and 
thought  out  of  which  the  poem  springs.  His  composi- 
tions, therefore,  with  all  their  elegance  and  finish, — 
their  "  superb  propriety  "  of  diction,  —  always  leave  the 
impression  of  having  been  born,  not  manufactured  or 
made.  No  melody  of  tone  is  ever  introduced  merely 
for  the  music,  no  flush  of  the  hues  of  language  is  ever 
used  merely  to  give  the  expression  a  bright  coloring, 
but  all  is  characteristic  and  artistic,  indicating  the  sub- 
ordination of  the  materials  to  the  man,  the  poetry  to  the 
poet.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  Bryant  is  so  valuable  a 
guide  to  young  lyrists,  who  are  so  prone  to  be  carried 
away  by  words,  and  who  emerge  from  their  tangled 
20 


306  BRYANT. 

wilderness  of  verbal  sweets  and  beauties,  without  any 
essential  sweetness  and  beauty  of  sentiment  and  imagi- 
nation, and  become,  at  best,  authors  of  poetical  lines  and 
images  rather  than  poems.  A  real  poet,  like  Bryant, 
accepting  the  limitations  of  his  nature,  and  never  going 
beyond  the  point  which  separates  inspiration  from  aspi- 
ration, creativeness  from  impressibility,  the  power  of 
vital  conception  from  the  power  of  vividly  appreciat- 
ing the  conceptions  of  others,  may  appear  small  in  com- 
parison with  those  adventurous  spirits  who  would  fuse 
Shakespeare,  Spenser,  and  Shelley  into  their  own  little 
individuality,  and  by  so  doing  lose  their  particular 
genius,  instead  of  gaining  the  universality  they  seek. 
The  genuineness  of  Bryant  is,  perhaps,  too  austerely 
conscientious,  and,  if  any  fault  can  be  found  with  him 
in  this  respect,  it  is  his  repression  of  poetic  instincts, 
which  might,  if  cultivated,  have  given  more  variety 
to  his  muse.  Surely,  the  little  poem  of  ''The  Mos- 
quito "  indicates  a  vein  of  sentiment,  delicate,  playful, 
and  genial,  that  might  have  been  developed  into  many 
a  piece  of  exquisite  poetical  wit  and  gracefully  fanciful 
humor,  which  would  have  relieved  the  sad,  sweet,  ear- 
nest tone  of  his  ordinary  meditations. 

Another  characteristic  of  Bryant's  poetical  diction  is 
its  fulness  of  matter.  Every  line  is  loaded  with  mean- 
ing. This  weight  and  wealth  and  compactness  of 


BRYANT.  307 

thought  sometimes  fail  to  impress  the  reader  in  his 
blank  verse,  on  account  of  its  swift  and  slipping  freedom 
of  movement ;  but  in  his  ringing  rhyme  they  are  forced 
upon  the  attention.  Take  his  lines  in  memory  of  Wil- 
liam Leggett,  and  read  them  with  a  lingering  emphasis 
on  the  substantives  and  the  substantial  epithets,  and 
note  how  much  life  and  meaning  is  condensed  in  the 
four  sounding  stanzas :  — 

"  The  earth  may  ring  from  shore  to  shore 

With  echoes  of  a  glorious  name, 
But  he  whose  loss  our  tears  deplore 
Has  left  behind  him  more  than  fame. 

"  For  when  the  death-frost  came  to  lie 

On  Leggett's  warm  and  mighty  heart, 
And  quench  his  bold  and  friendly  eye, 
His  spirit  did  not  all  depart. 

"  The  words  of  fire  that  from  his  pen 
Were  flung  upon  the  fervid  page, 
Still  move,  still  shake  the  hearts  of  men, 
Amid  a  cold  and  coward  age. 

"  His  love  of  truth,  too  warm,  too  strong, 

For  Hope  or  Fear  to  chain  or  chill, 
His  hate  of  tyranny  and  wrong, 
Burn  in  the  breasts  he  kindled  still." 

This  solidity  of  thought  is   perhaps  exhibited   too 
much   in   one    direction,   but   still    the    one-sidedness 


308  BRYANT. 

proceeds  from  a  limitation  of  poetical  sympathy,  not 
from  a  limitation  of  intellectual  power.  It  is,  after  all, 
the  variety  of  sentiments  bound  up  in  a  man's  individ- 
ual being  which  gives  variety  to  his  intellectual  mani- 
festation. Thus  we  find  in  Bryant  all  the  faculties  in 
vigorous  manhood,  —  observation,  judgment,  understand- 
ing, fancy,  imagination,  —  but,  in  poetry,  obeying  the 
direction  of  a  few  sentiments.  Those  who  have  followed 
his  career  as  an  editor,  and  have  read  his  masterly 
prose  articles  on  the  principles,  persons,  and  events  of 
the  time,  know  that  the  resources  of  his  large,  forcible, 
and  teeming  intellect  are  not  confined  to  meditations 
like  those  which  charm  us  in  "  Thanatopsis,"  but  are 
equal  to  all  the  demands  of  statement,  argument,  and 
controversy  ;  and  that  political  opponents  come  from 
the  perusal  of  one  of  his  scorching  leaders  in  a  less 
tranquil  mood  than  that  in  which  they  come  from  the 
perusal  of  one  of  his  tranquillizing  poems.  But  doubt- 
less the  finer  essence  of  the  man's  being  is  in  his 
metrical  compositions,  though  they  may  not  fully  in- 
dicate the  diversity  of  his  intellectual  gifts. 

In  using  the  term  "  sentiment,"  in  speaking  of  the  di- 
rection of  Bryant's  genius,  it  may  be  as  well  to  state 
what  we  mean.  In  our  sense  of  the  word  it  is  the  in- 
stinctive movement  of  the  poet's  mind  to  the  objects 
which  have  a  kind  of  magnetic  affinity  with  its  genius. 


BRYANT.  309 

A  poet,  therefore,  with  a  controlling  sentiment,  may 
almost  reach  perfection  in  the  representation  of  some 
things,  and  be  very  mediocre  the  moment  his  mind  is 
exercised  on  other  things.  Bryant  has  a  true  sentiment 
for  external  nature,  and  for  the  great  ideas,  abstracted 
from  actual  life  and  actual  men,  which  the  contempla- 
tion of  nature  evokes  and  nourishes  ;  but  he  has  not,  in 
addition  to  these,  the  sentiments  which  lead  the  intel- 
lect to  explore  the  depths  of  human  character,  and  find 
a  joy  in  the  concrete  facts  of  human  life.  There  are 
men  who  are  said  to  have  a  feeling  for  nature  simply 
because  they  yield  naturally  to  the  impressions  which 
scenery  excites  in  the  most  ordinary  minds,  —  impres- 
sions which  a  city  street  or  a  masked  ball  will  expel 
for  others,  which,  in  their  turn,  will  not  survive  the 
hour.  They  require  the  actual  presence  of  the  forms, 
colors,  hues,  and  sounds  of  objects,  in  order  to  receive 
their  gladness  or  their  gloom.  This  is  not  sentiment 
either  for  nature  or  for  society.  The  poet  of  nature 
would  be  haunted  by  the  images  he  saw  and  the  sensa- 
tions he  experienced,  in  the  absence  of  what  excited 
them  ;  the  poet  of  social  life,  or  the  dramatist,  would 
be  haunted  in  solitude  by  his  perceptions  gathered  in 
the  street  and  the  ball-room.  In  both  cases,  the 
impressions  would  be  lodged  in  the  imagination,  take  a 
new  and  finer  life  there,  be  brooded  over  with  delight, 


310  BRYANT. 

provoke  more  intense  and  deeper  feelings  as  perceptions 
transformed  than  as  perceptions  immediately  received, 
and  at  last  would  kindle  the  whole  mind  into  activity 
—  into  a  "  noble  rage  "  —  to  give  them  expression  in 
language.  This  is  the  process  by  which  nature  is 
poetically  described ;  this  the  process  by  which  human 
life  and  character  is  poetically  delineated.  It  is  the 
same  whether  the  object  be  a  daisy  or  an  Alp,  —  a 
Dogberry  or  a  Hamlet. 

Now  we  think  it  is  plain  that  Bryant,  as  a  poet,  has 
not  a  sentiment  for  human  life  and  character,  though  he 
has  a  deep  one  for  external  nature.  There  is  no  genial 
delineation  of  men  and  women,  as  individuals,  in  his 
writings.  When  he  glows  at  the  mention  of  a  name, 
we  find  it  is  not  a  person  he  is  celebrating,  but  some 
qualities  of  that  person,  abstracted  from  his  personality, 
and  idealized.  His  general  tone  toward  society  is 
harsh.  Could  he  have  seen  the  individual  that  hinted 
Falstaff,  or  Parolles,  or  Bottom,  to  Shakespeare,  such  a 
person  would  in  him  have  excited  simple  aversion  or 
contempt,  as  a  hateful  profligate,  a  lying  braggart,  or  a 
stupid  bore.  In  his  poems  he  continually  speaks  of 
escaping  from  the  crowd,  of  despising  the  frivolity  of 
society,  of  hating  the  every-day  work  by  which  man, 
in  this  life,  keeps  up  that  interesting  and  slightly 
important  connection  between  body  and  soul  called 


BRYANT.  311 

"  getting  a  living."  In  this  we  are,  of  course,  speaking 
of  Bryant  as  a  poet,  and  of  the  feelings  which  animate 
him  as  he  contrasts  the  nature  he  poetically  conceives 
with  the  social  life  he  prosaically  apprehends.  The 
result  is  that,  though  perhaps  the  first  of  poets  in 
America,  he  is  not  especially  an  American  poet,  for 
what  nationalizes  genius  is  not  so  much  the  scenery  it 
describes  as  the  human  life  it  idealizes.  Why,  Mr. 
Jefferson  Brick  inquires,  —  why  so  much  about  Ameri- 
can woods,  fields,  flowers,  birds,  beasts,  ocean,  and  sky, 
and  so  little  that  is  characteristic  about  American  men  ? 
Indeed,  the  real  concrete  life  of  the  nation,  —  that  na- 
tional life  which  even  in  meditative  English  poets,  like 
Wordsworth,  forms  the  basis  and  inspiration  of  so  many 
lofty  idealizations,  —  that  peculiar  something  in  almost 
all  English  poets,  which  proves  that  their  "  limbs  were 
made  in  England,"  —  seems  to  have  no  place  in  the 
genius  of  Bryant.  He  appears  rather  to  have  for  it  a 
subtle  and  supercilious  antipathy,  when,  as  a  poet,  he 
gives  himself  up  to  the  influences  of  nature.  It  is  no 
answer  to  this  that  some  of  his  most  glorious  poems  are 
dedicated  to  what  are  called  American  ideas  and  senti- 
ments, to  Right,  Truth,  Independence,  Freedom;  for 
these  appear  in  his  verse  as  abstracted,  not  only  from 
Americans,  but  almost  from  men,  and  smack  of  nothing 
learned  in  town-meeting,  or  caucus,  or  congress,  or 


312  BRYANT. 

church,  or  assembly  of  reformers.  A  seraph  singing  in 
the  air  could  hardly  be  more  stainless  and  less  charac- 
teristic. 

We  made  these  remarks  in  order  to  show  all  the 
more  clearly  the  depth  and  intensity  of  the  sentiment 
by  which  Bryant  is  led  to  nature  and  through  which 
he  becomes,  not  merely  a  worshipper  at  her  shrine, 
but  a  priest  of  her  mysteries,  and  an  interpreter  of  her 
symbolical  language  to  man.  Though  he  resembles 
Wordsworth  in  this  bias  of  his  genius,  he  resembles 
him  in  little  else,  and  imitates  nobody.  His  thoughts, 
emotions,  language,  are  all  his  own.  He  has  earned 
the  right  to  them  by  the  contact  of  his  mind  with  the 
objects  to  which  they  relate.  The  power  of  nature  to 
heal,  to  gladden,  to  inspire,  to  sublime,  to  lift  the  mind 
above  all  anxious  cares  and  petty  ambitions,  he  has 
tested  by  consciousness.  And  it  is  not  merely  the 
external  forms,  but  the  internal  spirit,  with  which  he 
has  communed.  He  sees  and  hears  with  his  soul,  as 
well  as  with  his  eye  and  ear.  Nature  to  him  is  alive, 
and  her  life  has  coursed  through  the  finest  veins  and 
passed  into  the  inmost  recesses  of  his  moral  being.  It 
is  this  which  compels  us  to  mingle  veneration  and 
wonder  with  admiration  and  delight,  in  reading  his 
works ;  it  is  this  which  gives  his  poems  their  character 
of  depth. 


BRYANT.  313 

Our  readers  may  consider  it  an  impertinence  to  give 
them  extracts  from  Bryant's  poems ;  and,  indeed,  the 
poems  from  which  extracts  would  naturally  be  made 
are  so  generally  known  that  we  almost  fear  to  try  the 
experiment.  But  surely,  the  following  lines  on  the 
"  Summer  Wind "  have  in  them  a  spirit  of  life  and 
beauty  which  keeps  them  ever  young ;  and  although  we 
have  known  them  from  a  boy,  they  seem  to  us  as  fresh 
as  though  they  were  now  published  for  the  first  time. 
Let  the  reader  note  how  perfect  the  piece  is  as  descrip- 
tion,—  how  completely  it  calls  up  the  images  and  sen- 
sations of  the  scene  to  his  own  mind,  —  and  how  the 
various  details  melt  into  unity  of  effect,  both  in  the 
sense  of  impressing  one  picture  on  the  imagination  and 
one  mood  on  the  heart,  —  and  he  will  not  regret  reading 
it  for  the  twentieth  time,  if  thereby  he  obtains  a  clear 
idea  of  the  difference  between  true  description,  and  that 
incongruous  jumble  of  details  which  often  takes  its 

name. 

"  It  is  a  sultry  day;  the  sun  has  drunk 
The  dew  that  lay  upon  the  morning  grass; 
There  is  no  rustling  in  the  lofty  elm 
That  canopies  my  dwelling,  and  its  shade 
Scarces  cools  me.    All  is  silent  save  the  faint 
And  interrupted  murmur  of  the  bee, 
Settling  on  the  sick  flowers,  and  then  again 
Instantly  on  the  wing.    The  plants  around 
Feel  the  too  potent  fervors;  the  tall  maize 


314  BRYANT. 

Rolls  up  its  long,  green  leaves;  the  clover  droops 
Its  tender  foliage,  and  declines  its  blooms; 
But  far,  in  the  fierce  sunshine  tower  the  hills, 
With  nil  their  growth  of  woods,  silent  and  stern; 
As  if  the  scorching  heat  and  dazzling  light 
Were  but  an  element  they  loved.     Bright  clouds, 
Motionless  pillars  of  the  brazen  heaven,  — 
Their  bases  on  the  mountains,  their  white  tops 
Shining  in  the  far  ether  —  fire  the  air, 
With  a  reflected  radiance,  and  make  turn 
The  gazer's  eyes  awry.    For  me,  I  lie 
Languidly  in  the  shade,  where  the  thick  tnrf, 
Yet  virgin  with  the  kisses  of  the  sun, 
Retains  some  freshness,  and  I  woo  the  wind 
That  still  delays  his  coming.    Why  so  slow, 
Gentle  and  voluble  spirit  of  the  air? 
0,  come  and  breathe  upon  the  fainting  earth 
Coolness  and  life !     Is  it  that  in  his  caves 
He  bears  me?    See,  on  yonder  woody  ridge, 
The  pine  is  hending  his  proud  top,  and  now 
Among  the  nearer  groves,  chestnut  and  oak 
Are  tossing  their  green  boughs  about.     He  comes ! 
Lo,  where  the  grassy  meadow  runs  in  waves ! 
The  deep  distressful  silence  of  the  scene 
Breaks  up  with  mingling  of  unnnmhered  sounds 
And  universal  motion.    He  is  come, 
Shaking  a  shower  of  blossoms  from  the  shrubs, 
And  bearing  on  their  fragrance;  and  he  brings 
Music  of  birds,  and  rustling  of  young  boughs, 
And  sound  of  swaying  branches,  and  the  voice 
Of  distant  waterfalls.    All  the  green  herbs 
Are  stirring  in  his  breath ;  a  thousand  flowers, 


BRYANT.  315 

By  the  roadside  nnd  the  borders  of  the  brook, 
Nod  gayly  to  each  other;  glossy  leaves 
Are  twinkling  in  the  sun,  as  if  the  dew 
Were  on  them  yet,  and  silver  waters  break 
Into  small  waves  aud  sparkle  as  he  comes." 

This  is  the  true  magic  of  poetry.  How  is  it  that  the 
whcls  scene  is  thus  made  to  "gush"  into  the  reader's 
mind  ?  How  is  it  that  every  small  detail  flows  softly 
into  its  proper  place  to  the  sound  of  its  own  music,  and, 
at  the  end,  we  are  blessed  with  a  summer  picture,  so 
alive  with  the  inmost  spirit  of  the  reality  that  we 
hardly  realize  it  is  December  as  we  read  ?  It  is  this 
unanalyzable,  inscrutable  thing  we  call  genius,  that 
makes  the  critic,  when  he  comes  to  the  real  mystery  of 
the  matter,  throw  by  his  pen  in  despair,  and  console  his 
mortified  analysis,  as  best  he  may,  with  Emerson's  fine 
saying,  "  that  it  is  the  essence  of  poetry  to  spring,  like 
the  rainbow-daughter  of  Wonder,  from  the  invisible,  to 
abolish  the  past,  and  refuse  all  history." 

The  healing  power  there  is  in  Bryant's  philosophic 
meditation  on  life,  the  fine  avenues  through  which  his 
thought  penetrates  to  what  is  deepest  in  the  soul,  and 
the  beautiful  serenity  he  not  only  feels  but  communi- 
cates, all  are  well  illustrated  in  his  poem  on  "The 
Return  of  Youth."  With  what  winning  sweetness  of 
mingled  reflection  and  imagination  he  smiles  away  all 


316  BRYANT. 

the  ugly  associations  connected  with  declining  years,  in 
the  following  stanzas :  — 

"  Yet  grieve  thou  not,  nor  think  thy  youth  is  gone, 

Nor  deem  that  glorious  season  e'er  could  die. 
Thy  pleasant  youth,  a  little  while  withdrawn, 

Waits  on  the  horizon  of  a  brighter  sky; 
Waits,  like  the  morn,  that  folds  her  wing  and  hides 

Till  the  slow  stars  bring  back  the  dawning  hour; 
Waits  like  the  vanished  spring,  that  slumbering  bides 

Her  own  sweet  time  to  waken  bud  and  flower. 

"  There  shall  he  welcome  thee,  when  thou  shnlt  stand 

On  his  bright  morning  hills,  with  smiles  more  sweet 
Than  when  at  first  he  took  thee  by  the  hand 

Through  the  fair  earth  to  lead  thy  tender  feet. 
He  shall  bring  back,  but  brighter,  broader  still, 

Life's  early  glory  to  thine  eyes  again, 
Shall  clothe  thy  spirit  with  new  strength,  and  fill 

Thy  leaping  heart  with  warmer  love  than  then. 

"  Hast  thou  not  glimpses,  in  the  twilight  here, 

Of  mountains  where  immortal  morn  prevails  ? 
Comes  there  not,  through  the  silence,  to  thine  ear 

A  gentle  rustling  of  the  morning  gales; 
A  murmur,  wafted  from  that  glorious  shore, 

Of  streams,  that  water  banks  forever  fair, 
And  voices  of  the  loved  ones  gone  before, 

More  musical  in  that  celestial  air?  " 

In   regard   to   the   versification    of  this   poem,   the 
reader  should   note   the   movement   and  music  of  the 


BRYANT.  31  f 

monosyllables.     Contrast  Pope's  fleer  at  monosyllabic 
words :  — 

"  And  ten  low  words  oft  creep  in  one  dull  line," 

with  this  grand  example  of  their  felicitous  use  by  Bry- 
ant:— 

"  Waits,  like  the  morn,  that  folds  her  wing  and  hides 
*•          Till  the  slow  stars  bring  back  her  dawning  hour." 

From  the  noble  poem  on  the  "Antiquity  of  Free- 
dom," we  extract  a  passage  made  of  sterner  stuff:  — 

"  0  Freedom !  thou  art  not,  as  poets  dream, 
A  fair  young  girl,  with  light  and  delicate  limbs, 
And  wavy  tresses  gushing  from  the  cap 
With  which  the  Roman  master  crowned  his  slave 
When  he  took  off  the  gyves.    A  bearded  man, 
Armed  to  the  teeth,  art  thou;  one  mailed  hand 
Grasps  the  broad  shield,  and  one  the  sword ;  thy  brow, 
Glorious  in  beauty  though  it  be,  is  scarred 
With  tokens  of  old  wars ;  thy  massive  limbs 
Are  strong  with  struggling.    Power  at  thee  has  launched 
His  bolts,  and  with  his  lightnings  smitten  thee; 
They  could  not  quench  the  life  thou  hast  from  heaven. 
Merciless  power  has  dug  thy  dungeon  deep, 
And  his  swart  armorers,  by  a  thousand  fires, 
Have  forged  thy  chain;  yet,  while  he  deems  thee  bound, 
The  links  are  shivered,  and  the  prison  walls 
Fall  outward;  terribly  thou  springest  forth, 
As  springs  the  flame  above  a  burning  pile, 
And  shoutest  to  the  nations,  who  return 
Thy  shoutings,  while  the  pale  oppressor  flies." 


318  BRYANT. 

In  the  last  line  we  have  a  pertinent  example  of  the 
amount  of  suggestion  which  can  be  conveyed  by  the 
movement  of  verse,  independent  of  the  exact  meaning 
of  the  words.  What  a  sneaking  and  snakelike  sug- 
gestion there  is  in  the  way  the  verse  slinks  and  halts, 
close  on  to  its  previous  joyous  tumult,  — 

"  While  the  pale  oppressors/lies." 

The  concluding  paragraphs  of  this  poem  we  cannot 
resist  the  temptation  to  extract.  The  poet  has  just 
been  speaking  of  the  superior  Antiquity  of  Freedom  to 
Tyranny,  and  proceeds  to  detail  the  refinements  that 
the  latter  learns  in  an  advanced  and  civilized  period 
of  the  world :  — 

"  Thou  shalt  wax  stronger  with  the  lapse  of  years, 
But  he  shall  fade  into  a  feebler  age ; 
Feebler,  yet  subtler.    He  shall  weave  his  snares, 
And  spring  them  on  thy  careless  steps,  and  clap 
His  withered  hands,  tind  from  their  ambush  call 
His  hordes  to  fall  upon  thee.    He  shall  send 
Quaint  maskers,  wearing  fair  and  gallant  forms 
To  catch  thy  gaze,  and  uttering  graceful  words 
To  charm  thy  ear;  while  his  sly  imps,  by  stealth, 
Twine  round  thee  threads  of  steel,  light  thread  on  thread 
That  grow  to  fetters;  or  bind  down  thy  arms 
Withchainscoucealedinchaplets.    Oh!  not  yet 
Mayst  thou  unbrace  thy  corselet,  nor  lay  by 
Thy  sword;  nor  yet,  0  Freedom!  close  thy  lids 


BRYANT.  319 

In  slumber;  for  thine  enemy  never  sleeps. 

And  thou  must  watch  and  combat  till  the  day 

Of  the  new  earth  and  heaven.    But  wouldst  thou  rest 

Awhile  from  tumult  and  the  frauds  of  men, 

These  old  and  friendly  solitudes  invite 

Thy  visit.     They,  while  yet  the  forest  trees 

Were  young  upon  the  unviolated  earth, 

And  yet  the  moss  stains  on  the  rock  were  new, 

Beheld  thy  glorious  childhood  and  rejoiced." 

But  for  sweetness,  melody,  rich  description,  rapt 
meditation,  and  high  philosophy,  all  bathed  in  that 
softening  and  harmonizing  light  "  which  never  was  on 
sea  or  land,"  —  for  pure  thought  and  emotion  embodied 
in  pure  beauty  of  form,  —  we  love  the  "Land  of 
Dreams  "  almost  beyond  any  other  of  Bryant's  poems. 
Even  those  of  our  readers  who  have  it  by  heart,  and 
in  their  hearts,  will  pardon  its  reappearance  to  their 
eyes : — 

"  A  mighty  realm  is  the  Land  of  Dreams, 

With  steeps  that  hang  in  the  twilight  sky, 
And  weltering  oceans  and  trailing  streams, 
That  gleam  where  the  dusky  valleys  lie. 

"  But  over  its  shadowy  border  flow 

Sweet  rays  from  the  world  of  endless  morn, 
And  the  nearer  fountains  catch  the  glow, 
And  flowers  in  the  nearer  fields  are  born. 

"  The  souls  of  the  happy  dead  repair, 

From  their  bowers  of  light,  to  that  bordering  land, 


320  BRYANT. 

And  walk  in  the  fainter  glory  there, 
With  the  souls  of  the  living  hand  in  hand. 

"  One  calm,  sweet  smile,  in  that  shadowy  sphere, 

From  eyes  that  open  on  earth  no  more,  — 
One  warning  word  from  a  voice  once  dear, — 
How  they  rise  in  the  memory  o'er  and  o'er ! 

"Far  off  from  those  hills  that  shine  by  day, 

And  fields  that  bloom  in  the  heavenly  gales, 
The  Land  of  Dreams  goes  stretching  away 
To  dimmer  mountains  and  darker  vales. 

"There  lie  the  chambers  of  guilty  delight, 
There  walk  the  spectres  of  guilty  fear, 
And  soft  low  voices,  that  float  through  the  night, 
Are  whispering  sin  in  the  helpless  ear. 

"Dear  maid,  in  thy  childhood's  opening  flower, 

Scarce  weaned  from  the  love  of  childish  play! 
The  tears  on  whose  cheeks  are  but  the  shower 
That  freshens  the  early  bloom  of  May ! 

"  Thine  eyes  are  closed,  and  over  thy  brow 

Pass  thoughtful  shadows  and  joyous  gleams, 
And  I  know,  by  thy  moving  lips,  that  now 
Thy  spirit  strays  in  the  Land  of  Dreams. 

"  Light-hearted  maiden,  0,  heed  thy  feet! 

O,  keep  where  that  beam  of  Paradise  falls, 
And  only  wander  where  thou  mayst  meet 
The  blessed  ones  from  its  shining  walls. 

"  So  shalt  thou  come  from  the  Land  of  Dreams, 
With  love  and  peace  to  this  world  of  strife; 


BRYANT.  321 

And  the  light  that  over  that  border  streams 
Shall  lie  on  the  path  of  thy  daily  life." 

In  this  notice  of  Bryant's  poems,  we  have  not  done 
justice  to  our  conceptions  of  his  poetic  character  and 
genius,  and,  indeed,  have  attempted  to  do  little  more 
than  to  assist,  if  possible,  the  circulation  of  his  writings 
among  classes  of  readers  to  whom  he  may  be  still  com- 
paratively unknown.  There  is  a  great  deal  of  positive 
intellectual  and  spiritual  good  which  the  American  peo- 
ple can  obtain  from  Bryant ;  for  Bryant  has,  in  large 
measure,  the  very  qualities  in  which  the  American  peo- 
ple are  deficient.  His  works  are  wholesome  food  for 
the  mind  and  heart ;  and  although  their  circulation  has 
been  extensive,  in  the  sense  in  which  we  use  that  word 
in  speaking  of  the  circulation  of  books  of  poem?,  it 
has  not  been  extensive  in  the  sense  of  penetrating  the 
masses  of  that  vast  army  of  readers  which,  in  our  day, 
we  have  seen  engaged  on  one  book.  We  should  be 
delighted,  as  philanthropists  as  well  as  critics,  to  learn 
that  his  poems  were  in  every  home  in  the  land ;  for, 
unlike  many  books  that  by  some  means  get  into  homes, 
their  mission  is 

"  To  heal  and  cleanse,  not  madden  and  pollute." 


21 


STUPID  CONSERVATISM  AND   MALIG- 
NANT EEFORM. 


THE  most  comprehensive  division  of  the  human  race 
is  into  men  who  have  common  sense  and  men  who 
have  not  This  common  sense  has  its  general  mani- 
festation in  individuals  of  mediocre  but  balanced  minds, 
who  possess  moderate  powers  orderly  related;  but  its 
noblest  expression  is  in  men  of  the  highest  order  of 
genius,  who  possess  large  powers  harmoniously  com- 
bined. Both  in  genius  and  mediocrity,  however,  the 
distinguishing  characteristic  of  the  quality  is  modera- 
tion, the  perception  of  things  in  their  right  relations, 
and  the  refusal  of  the  will  to  be  whirled  away  by  im- 
pulses from  truths  passionately  misunderstood.  The 
general  sum  of  intelligence  and  virtue  in  a  community 
is  indicated  by  the  degree  of  moderation  evinced  in  the 
conduct  of  its  practical  affairs.  As  this  moderation  in- 
cludes in  itself  the  whole  science  of  limitations,  and  is 
the  condition  of  moral  and  mental  health,  wherever  it 
is  absent  principles  subside  into  generalities,  and  virtues 
fret  themselves  into  vices. 


STUPID    CONSERVATISM.  323 

Now  it  is  one  of  the  most  significant  characteristics 
of  our  day  that  this  moderation  is  confounded  on  its 
moral  side  with  pusillanimity,  and  on  its  mental  side 
with  commonplace.  The  natural  consequence  of  this 
is,  that  all  men  who  desire  to  obtain  a  reputation  for 
virtue  and  intelligence  —  we  say  reputation,  for  virtue 
arid  intelligence  themselves  are  not  apt  to  have  such  a 
desire  predominant  —  instinctively  despise  the  common 
and  rush  off  into  some  extreme.  Intemperance  in  the 
advocacy  of  temperance,  illiberality  in  the  advocacy  of 
liberalism,  intolerance  in  sustaining  toleration,  are  now 
the  chief  signs  of  that  strange  masquerade  of  the  pas- 
sions which  passes  with  some,  who  are  not  by  instinct 
philanthropists,  under  the  name  of  philanthropy.  To 
push  one  virtue  to  a  fanatical  excess  and  disturb  the 
objective  relations  of  things ;  to  pour  out  a  passionate 
flood  of  indignation  at  every  seeming  evil;  to  indulge 
more  in  invectives  than  facts,  in  interjections  than 
arguments ;  to  be,  in  short,  a  fifth-rate  dialectician, 
and  a  first-rate  word-piler,  —  these,  the  appropriate 
marks  of  the  boy  and  the  shrew,  are  now  deemed  the 
shining  characteristics  of  a  mind  free  from  antiquated 
prejudices,  and  centuries  in  advance  of  the  age.  In  a 
society  which  recognizes  sensibility  and  the  lungs  as 
the  grand  peculiarities  which  distinguish  human  from 
brute  nature,  and  which  deifies  the  tongue  to  the 


324  STUPID   CONSERVATISM. 

denial  of  thought,  it  is  almost  impossible  for  common 
sense  to  obtain  a  hearing.  The  opposition  of  the  sensi- 
tive is  crushed  by  a  storm  of  abuse ;  the  opposition  of 
the  prudent  is  vented  in  an  exclamation  of  disgust; 
and,  accordingly,  the  noisiest  babbler  that  blows  the 
penny-trumpet  of  his  rage  is  heard  far  above  the  still 
small  voice  of  a  community's  conscience  and  intelli- 
gence, and  seems,  to  some  wondering  gapers,  the  great 
man  he  affects.  The  difference  between  a  ball  and  a 
bubble  is,  that  one  can  stand  the  thrust  of  analysis,  the 
other  collapses  into  suds  the  moment  it  is  pricked. 
Perhaps  it  would  be  well  not  to  confine  this  test  to 
bubbles  which  have  sprung  from  the  marriage  of  soap 
and  water,  but  to  extend  it  to  those  which  have  their 
being  in  moral  froth  and  mental  wind. 

The  first  obstacle  to  a  trial  of  this  process  is  the 
sensitiveness  of  pretension,  and  the  clatter  which  the 
mere  mention  of  examination  rouses  among  its  cham- 
pions. A  person  is  sure  to  be  honored  with  the  invec- 
tive of  every  professor  of  benevolence,  if  he  attempt  to 
discuss  the  bad  tendencies  of  any  popular  philanthropy, 
from  any  position  midway  between  fat  and  stupid  con- 
servatism and  lean  and  malignant  reform.  In  every 
age  of  the  world,  the  fiercer  class  of  tories  and  radicals, 
that  is,  the  class  of  men  who  do  not  reason,  have 
monopolized  the  vocabulary  of  passion,  and  plentifully 


STUPID   CONSERVATISM.  325 

distributed  the  phrases  of  malice.  Accordingly,  those 
persons  who  have  doubted  the  divine  right  of  kings  and 
the  divine  right  of  regicides,  who  have  withstood  the 
dictation  of  tyranny  and  the  insolence  of  anarchy,  who 
have,  in  short,  striven  hard  to  avoid  being  wrecked  on 
the  opposite  shores  of  nonsense,  have  paid  the  penalty 
of  their  moderation  in  being  placed  between  the  two 
fires  of  fanaticism.  It  was  a  remark  of  Swift,  that  an 
honest  man  could  be  distinguished,  from  the  fact  that 
all  the  rogues  were  in  confederacy  against  him.  It 
is  certain  that  a  sensible  one  needs  no  other  tribute  to 
his  intelligence  than  the  vituperation  of  the  insensible 
and  the  bigoted. 

On  the  first  blush  it  appears  unjust  to  accuse  any 
man,  engaged  in  an  assault  on  the  evil  of  the  world, 
and  seemingly  conscientious  in  his  maddest  outpourings 
of  abuse,  of  envy,  pride,  and  malice  ;  but  no  student  of 
history  and  human  nature  can  have  missed  the  fact, 
that  the  opinions  of  a  saint  and  the  actions  of  a  savage 
are  often  found  in  the  same  person,  and  that  when  any 
portentous  crime  has  been  perpetrated,  it  has  been 
commonly  done  on  the  plea  of  serving  some  great  and 
just  purpose.  The  world  has  had  its  full  share  of 
honest  bigots  and  sincere  tyrants  ;  of  men  like  Ximenes, 
who  wished  to  rid  the  world  of  infidels ;  of  men  like 
Robespierre,  who  wished  to  rid  the  world  of  oppressors. 


326  STUPID    CONSERVATISM.    . 

The  principles  of  religion  and  liberty  have  ever  been 
Ihe  cloaks  of  atheistical  and  despotic  deeds.  No  man 
can  act  without  some  regard  to  his  own  conscience  and 
the  opinion  of  mankind;  and  few  enormities  have  ever 
been  committed  without  some  fair  pretext,  which  more 
or  less  deceived  the  author.  Thus  Caspar  conquered 
barbarous  nations  on  the  plea  of  civilizing  them,  and 
enslaved  his  country  on  the  plea  of  reforming  it ;  and 
the  blood  of  a  million  men,  shed  to  slake  the  measure- 
less thirst  of  his  ambition,  was  nominally  a  sacrifice  to 
the  genius  of  progress.  Thus  Cromwell  easily  con- 
nected the  overthrow  of  the  enemies  of  God  with  the 
triumph  of  the  Parliamentarians,  and  his  own  con- 
quest of  the  Parliament  as  the  same  military  theol- 
ogy carried  to  its  holiest  logical  consequences.  Thus 
Napoleon  never  concluded  to  perform  some  act  of  self- 
aggrandizement,  which  involved  a  disregard  or  betrayal 
of  the  rights  of  others,  without  placing  himself  in  the 
attitude  of  an  injured  man,  and  fiercely  inveighing 
against  the  rascality  or  perfidy  of  his  victims.  These 
wolf-lambs  and  hawk-doves  have  cast  ominous  doubt 
on  professions.  The  antithesis  between  tongue  and 
heart,  word  and  thing,  is  an  old  arrangement  of  de- 
pravity,—  a  pinchbeck  gem  from  the  antique  which 
has  lost  none  of  its  sparkle  from  age. 

In  treating  this  subject  of  Stupid  Conservatism  and 


STUPID   CONSERVATISM.  327 

Malignant  Reform,  it  is  important  to  yoke  them  together, 
for  they  commonly  exist  as  cause  and  effect.  It  is  the 
peculiarity  of  both  that  they  have  no  real  vitality,  no 
conception  of  the  life  and  purpose  of  things,  no  percep- 
tion of  the  organic  in  nature  or  society,  no  power  of 
communicating  intellectual  and  moral  life.  Apathy  is 
the ''characteristic  of  the  .stupid  phase  of  conservatism, 
anarchy  is  the  characteristic  of  the  malignant  phase  of 
reform.  They  both  produce  and  detest  each  other ; 
and,  perhaps,  if  either  could  come  to  self-consciousness, 
it  would  detest  itself.  The  moment  any  considerable 
number  of  men  in  a  social  system  lose  all  perception 
of  the  spiritual  bond  which  unites  them,  and  become 
slaves  to  the  forms  of  their  concrete  existence,  they 
are  ever  sure  to  lapse  into  a  contented,  self-sufficing, 
stupid  state,  which  inevitably  stimulates  the  hatred  and 
disgust  of  another  class,  who  have  loftier  opinions  of 
life,  without  ever  having  realized  loftier  ideas  of  it. 
Facts,  institutions,  social  arrangements,  are  embodied 
ideas,  —  thoughts  which  originally  were  gifted  with  cre- 
ative power,  and  forced  themselves  into  tilings.  Facts 
are  either  living  or  dead  according  as  they  are  or  are 
not  animated  and  informed  by  idea;?.  Now  the  stu- 
pid conservative  has  no  conception  of  the  principles 
whence  the  institutions  he  defends  draw  their  life,  but 
simply  has  a  hard  prejudice  for  the  forms  in  which  he 


328  STUPID    CONSERVATISM. 

finds  them  cast ;  resents  all  alteration  of  the  forms  even 
when  that  alteration  is  merely  the  result  of  natural 
growth  ;  and,  finding  no  safety  for  society  except  in 
apathy,  is  the  stagnant  exponent  and  sluggish  champion 
of  mental  death,  never  so  much  delighted  as  when  the 
whole  social  body  has  the  repose  of  a  corpse.  The 
vices  developed  by  such  a  state  of  mind  are  those  natu- 
rally engendered  by  selfishness  of  purpose  and  littleness 
of  thought.  They  have  produced,  and  are  producing, 
vast  evils  in  the  world ;  and  among  their  many  mischie- 
vous fruits  we  may  emphasize  the  insurrection  they 
excite  among  sour,  excitable,  and  self-willed  spirits, 
quick-witted  enough  to  detect  and  despise  the  stupidities 
of  conservative  selfishness,  but  without  sufficient  sweet- 
ness of  disposition,  depth  of  insight,  and  elevation  of 
character,  to  escape  a  virulent  selfishness  of  another 
kind.  The  theories  and  actions  of  stupid  conservatism 
are  thus  met  and  matched  by  the  theories  and  actions 
of  malignant  reform;  enemies  of  each  other,  they  are 
jointly  enemies  of  all  the  true  wisdom,  intelligence,  and 
moderation  of  the  community  in  which  their  feuds  rage 
and  foam ;  and  together  they  do  all  in  their  power  to 
discredit  and  bring  into  contempt  both  the  cause  of 
conservatism  and  the  cause  of  reform. 

Influence,  good  or  bad,  comes  not  from  the  opinions 
a  man  professes,  but  from  the  character  he  has  formed, 


STUPID   CONSERVATISM.  329 

and  the  life  he  leads  ;  and  malice  uttering  the  common- 
places of  meekness,  or  selfishness  prating  glibly  in  the 
phraseology  of  benevolence,  can  only  communicate  to 
others  the  life  of  malice  and  selfishness ;  and  thus  it  is 
that  so  much  of  the  Satanic  in  disposition  finds  a  vent  in 
the  propositions  of  charity  and  love,  and  that  opinions 
on  which  angels  might  gossip  often  come  from  lips 
touched  with  a  fire  not  from  heaven.  Now  the  source 
of  popular  misjudgments  in  this  matter  is  in  confound- 
ing moral  commonplaces  with  moral  character,  and  in 
calling  a  man  of  philanthropical  or  reforming  opinions 
by  the  name  of  philanthropist  or  reformer,  without  re- 
gard to  his  possession  of  the  ideas,  sentiment,  spirit,  and 
character  which  distinguish  philanthropy  from  misan- 
thropy, and  reform  from  lawlessness.  The  inward, 
essential  life  of  the  man,  which  is  the  real  thing  to  be 
computed,  as  it  is  the  real  thing  communicated,  is  over- 
looked in  doing  homage  to  the  abstract  truth  of  his 
propositions ;  and  thus,  in  the  popular  estimation,  a 
person  gifted  only  with  the  form  without  the  spirit  of 
philanthropy  is  considered  a  philanthropist,  just  as  a 
person  doggedly  blind  to  everything  but  the  form  of 
conservatism,  is  dignified  by  the  title  of  conservative. 

But  perhaps  the  great  strength  of  the  malignants  who 
infest  the  profession  of  benevolence  proceeds  from  the 
ingenious  combination  of  truth  and  falsehood  in  their 


330  STUPID   CONSERVATISM. 

opinions.  A  system  of  thought  compounded  of  truisms 
and  paradoxes,  one  part  intended  to  flatter  the  sagacity 
of  superficial  understandings,  and  the  other  part  to 
foment  the  passions  of  discontented  hearts,  and  both 
parts  true  to  nothing  in  the  concrete  life  of  the  com- 
munity it  is  shaped  to  disturb,  exactly  realizes  that 
union  of  shallow  thought  and  vehement  sensibility 
•which  is  the  condition  of  mental  and  moral  anarchy. 
Facts  and  things  being  the  creation,  not  of  mechanical 
understandings  but  of  living  men,  and  as  organisms 
rejecting  the  tests  of  exterior  rules  and  principles,  can- 
not stand  a  criticism  which  does  not  recognize  their 
root  in  human  nature,  their  appropriateness  to  the  ends 
they  were  created  to  serve,  or  the  internal  processes  by 
which  they  are  to  be  renovated  and  reformed.  Here 
is  the  work  of  the  human  race,  —  there  are  the  opinions 
of  Mr.  Somebody,  himself  no  better  than  the  majority 
of  the  race,  and  without  any  power  in  himself  to  create 
anything;  and  we  are  informed  that  because  facts  do 
not  square  with  his  notions,  have  not  been  manufactured 
after  his  pattern,  and  do  not  agree  with  his  arithmetic, 
that  they  are  only  worthy  of  being  the  objects  of  his 
indignant  rhetoric,  —  which  is  degrading  them,  indeed. 
In  addition  to  this,  we  are  told  that  the  imperfections 
he  detects  in  existing  institutions  are  not  visible  to 
other  men,  but  that  the  discovery  was  the  precious  re- 


STUPID    CONSERVATISM.  331 

ward  of  his  superior  insight;  whereas,  in  fact,  his  whole 
system  of  thought  proceeds  on  the  principle  of  rejecting 
insight,  vision  into  the  interior  constitution  of  things, 
for  a  string  of  generalities  which  any  child  can  as  read- 
ily perceive,  and  as  triumphantly  apply  as  himself.  He 
criticizes  society,  indeed,  as  Rhymer  or  Dennis  criti- 
ci/.^d  Shakespeare,  and  the  generalities  of  his  sterile  eth- 
ics are  about  on  a  par  with  the  generalities  of  their 
barren  taste. 

Now  if  a  man  of  moderate  mental  and  moral  powers, 
neither  better  nor  worse  than  the  majority  of  the  com- 
munity in  which  he  lives,  starts  with  the  capital  mistake 
of  ignoring  facts  and  deifying  opinion?,  the  process  by 
which  he  gradually  sours  into  a  malignant  reformer  is 
exceedingly  simple.  His  character  is  not  up  to  what 
he  is  pleased  to  call  his  principles,  and  the  moment  he 
announces  the  latter  he  is  subjected  to  annoyances  cal- 
culated to  fret  his  temper  and  stimulate  his  pugnacity. 
Convinced  in  his  own  mind  of  the  truth  of  his  darling 
propositions,  he  finds  to  his  amazement  that  they  are 
doubted  by  some,  denounced  by  others,  treated  with 
a  certain  smiling  indifference  by  still  more;  and  lie 
knows  no  readier  way  of  solving  the  problem  of  this 
opposition  than  by  charitably  imputing  it  to  selfishness, 
knavery,  or  folly.  His  conceit  of  his  own  virtue,  be- 
nevolence, and  wisdom  enlarges  with  each  consignment 


332  STUPID    CONSERVATISM. 

of  other  people  into  the  category  of  knaves  and  fools ; 
and,  accordingly,  in  an  extremely  limited  period  we 
find  him  chuckling  over  the  discovery  that  he  is  some 
centuries  in  advance  of  his  age,  and  glorying  in  the 
greatness  of  being  a  prophet  of  the  future.  While  he 
is  revelling  in  this  soft  delirium  of  vanity,  up  starts  fat- 
witted  conservatism,  and  in  an  agony  of  fear  for  the 
salvation  of  stupidity,  pitches  at  him  all  the  moss- 
covered  phrases  of  its  antique  vocabulary  ;  and  while  the 
words  "  fool,"  "  incendiary,"  "  rebel,"  and  "  fanatic  "  are 
whizzing  over  his  head,  they  flash  into  it  the  delicious 
thought  that  he  is  a  martyr.  This  last  revelation  fin- 
ishes his  education.  From  that  moment  he  takes  out 
a  patent  for  execration,  and  devotes  his  time  to  hating 
men  and  loving  man,  misanthropy  eating  into  his  heart 
as  fast  as  philanthropy  dances  from  his  tongue. 

In  truth,  it  is  not  sufficiently  considered  that  to  be  a 
philanthropist  is  to  reach  that  highest  grace  of  charac- 
ter in  which  strength  is  united  to  sweetness,  power  to 
love ;  that  the  severest  trial  of  philanthropy  is  to  war 
with  selfishness  without  catching  the  disease ;  that  it 
begins  in  love  to  individuals,  and  widens  gradually  into 
love  for  mankind ;  that  by  a  certain  divine  felicity  of 
nature  it  returns  magnanimity  for  meanness,  love  for 
hatred,  meekness  for  arrogance ;  that  it  is  hopeful, 
genial,  disinterested,  patient,  forbearing,  persistent,  in- 


STUPID    CONSERVATISM.  333 

flnential,  radiating  light  and  warmth  from  its  own  ful- 
ness of  life,  and  above  the  littleness  of  wreaking  the 
grudges  of  vanity  and  self-will  in  the  invectives  of 
malice.  In  short,  the  thing  itself  is  still  rare,  although 
the  word  has  been  amazingly  cheapened ;  and  the  word 
has  power  to  stir  associations  so  beautiful,  elevated,  and 
sevene,  that  it  would  be  a  worthy  ambition  for  some 
knight-errant  of  language  to  rescue  it  from  the  con- 
tempt into  which  it  has  fallen,  since  it  has  been  made 
the  convenient  cover  of  so  much  acid  and  acrimonious 
misanthropy. 

But  it  may  be  objected  to  all  this  celebration  of  the 
virtues  peculiar  to  philanthropy,  that  it  is  a  cheap  way  of 
avoiding  the  responsibility  of  doing  anything  for  man- 
kind, and  that  the  serpent  of  selfish  indifference  peeps  out 
from  among  its  rose-leaves  of  rhetoric.  A  sour  reformer 
might  retort  that  the  practical  question  is,  how  are  we 
to  upset  the  stupidities  and  rascalities  of  society  and 
government,  strong  as  they  are  in  all  the  strength  of 
stupidity,  keen  as  they  are  in  all  the  keenness  of  ras- 
cality? Will  bright  words,  and  beautiful  sentiments, 
and  sweet  rebukes  do  it  ?  No ;  the  rack  and  the  hot 
iron  must  be  called  in ;  and  the  whole  set  subjected 
to  a  torture  which,  if  it  result  not  in  victory,  "  will 
be  at  least  revenge."  The  real  fact  of  the  case,  our 
opponent  would  argue,  is  this,  —  that  the  whole  affair 


834  STUPID    CONSERVATISM. 

is  a  dog-and-cat  fight  between  rascality  and  honesty, 
and  that  in  such  a  contest  we  must  scratch  and  bite 
and  snarl  with  a  beautiful  adaptation  of  our  powers  to 
the  exigency  of  the  occasion.  Stupidity  has  a  force  of 
its  own,  against  which  the  gods  themselves  are  power- 
less ;  it  cannot  be  reached  by  weapons  forged  in  celes- 
tial armories ;  and,  accordingly,  we  prefer  to  dart  scorn 
and  hatred  at  it,  —  to  fret,  tease,  caricature,  and  torment 
it,  —  and,  as  it  is  insensible  to  the  honey  of  benevolence, 
to  make  it  wince  under  the  sting.  If  the  fight  be  thus 
a  fight  between  stupidity  and  malice,  —  the  two  nega- 
tives in  the  social  sentence,  —  we  do  not  know  but  that 
the  majority  of  sensible  people  should  be  as  blandly 
indifferent  to  the  issue  as  was  the  amiable  old  lady  who 
witnessed  her  husband's  struggle  with  the  bear.  At 
any  rate,  it  is  curious  that  a  man  should  claim  to  be  a 
philanthropist  on  the  ground  that  he  has  renounced  the 
first  principle  of  philanthropy,  and  considers  moral 
power  as  too  valuable  a  thing  to  be  wasted  on  the 
rogues  he  would  still  convert.  The  assumption  re- 
minds us  of  a  theory  which  regulates  the  epistolary 
compositions  of  a  gentleman  of  our  acquaintance,  who 
considers  grammar  and  orthography  as  too  expensive 
luxuries  to  be  squandered  in  his  private  correspond- 
ence. 

As  these  remarks  are  strictly  confined  to  the  ma- 


STUPID    CONSERVATISM.  335 

lignants  of  benevolence,  to  those  small,  sharp,  aggres- 
sive minds,  who  glory  in  the  conceit  of  being  prophets 
and  martyr-:,  in  virtue  of  dipping  soulless  ethical  truisms 
in  the  gall  of  unloving  hearts,  we  shall  not  attempt  an 
analysis  of  that  phase  of  philanthropy  in  which  a  real 
enthusiasm  for  right  and  duty,  springing  from  compre- 
hensiveness of  feeling,  is  combined  with  intense  and 
elevated,  but  somewhat  narrow  thought  in  conceiving 
plans.  Philanthropists  of  this  kind  do  not  always  bear 
the  shock  of  collision  with  what  is  base  and  stupid, 
without  having  their  austerity  sour  into  moroseness, 
and  without  infusing  a  little  vitriol  into  their  virtue ; 
but  they  still  draw  their  inspiration  from  the  benevolent 
instead  of  the  malignant  instincts,  have  few  opinions 
which  are  not  vitalized  into  principles  and  organized 
into  character,  and  are  of  course  to  be  discriminated 
from  that  other  class  who  are  engaged  in  a  scheme  of 
cheapening  all  the  moral  virtues  by  a  process  which 
dilutes  love  and  condenses  malice. 

It  is  evident  that  in  our  enlightened  age,  so  given 
up  to  the  brag  of  benevolence,  a  malevolent  spirit 
could  not  animate  so  many  reforming  schemes  without 
breaking  into  literature,  and  insisting  on  having  its  rep- 
resentatives in  romance.  The  form  it  has  commonly 
assumed,  in  order  to  push  its  doctrines,  is  that  best 
calculated  to  reach  the  largest  number  of 


336  STUPID    CONSERVATISM. 

namely,  the  novel;  and  certainly  it  has  displayed  in 
this  -a  good  deal  of  shrewdness,  for  if  it  had  relied  on 
its  plain  ethics  and  metaphysics,  it  would  simply  have 
increased  the  number  of  deaths  by  gaping.  It  has, 
however,  succeeded  to  a  great  extent  in  corrupting 
romance  with  a  new  nonsense  and  a  new  immorality ; 
and  though  many  of  its  productions  are  as  stupid  as 
they  are  brazen,  and  are  about  the  dearest  things  which 
a  prodigal  can  obtain  for  his  shilling,  some  of  them 
bear  the  signs  of  misdirected  talent  and  morbid  genius. 
So  extensive  has  the  evil  become,  that  one  can  hardly 
take  up  a  new  novel  without  some  expectation  of  being 
conducted  through  a  series  of  imagined  characters  and 
events  in  which  virtue  is  exhibited  as  mere  conven- 
tional convenience,  and  crime  as  the  road  by  which 
great  souls  reach  the  knowledge  of  their  natural  rights. 
As  the  didactive  malignants  would  overturn  existing 
facts  and  institutions,  in  order  to  satisfy  the  anarchical 
demands  of  their  truisms,  so  the  romantic  malignants 
would  subvert  the  organized  morality  and  religion 
of  society,  by  paradoxes  which  are  merely  inverted 
truisms. 

Now  this  literature  has  been  for  a  considerable  period 
creating  the  taste  which  it  addresses.  From  its  book- 
stall intreuchments  it  has  invaded  kitchens,  fought  its 
way  into  parlors,  and  now  constitutes  a  large  portion 


STUPID   CONSERVATISM.  337 

of  the  people's  reading.  Altogether,  it  has  come  to  be 
a  greater  public  evil  than  smooth  scholars  and  dainty 
critics  are  inclined  to  believe,  as  it  is  day  by  day 
forming  in  the  public  mind  thoughts  which  eventually 
promise  to  be  things.  England  is  kind  enough  to  fur- 
nish ruffians,  and  France  to  furnish  philosophies,  to  help 
on  the  Satanic  cause  both  with  representatives  and 
systems  of  diabolism ;  and  Jonathan  Wild  can  here  fra- 
ternize with  George  Sand.  Every  element  of  black- 
guardism and  false  sentiment  which  our  country  can 
furnish  is  blended  with  the  importation,  and  the  result 
is  a  compound  mass  of  passionate  nonsense,  immorality, 
and  irreligion,  passing  under  the  nickname  of  popular 
literature. 

Now  it  is  evident  that  the  extension  of  such  a  taste 
as  these  monstrosities  of  romance  pander  to  will  soon 
be  more  or  less  felt  throughout  the  profession  of  letters. 
The  purity  of  literature  depends  on  the  decency  of 
readers  ;  authors,  relying  on  the  public  for  their  subsist- 
ence, must  furnish  the  article  most  in  demand ;  and  if 
blasphemy,  ribaldry,  and  licentiousness  be  the  demand, 
blasphemy,  ribaldry,  and  licentiousness  will  be  the 
supply.  Such  appears  to  be  the  most  universal  law 
which  can  be  generalized  from  literary  history ;  but 
stupid  conservatism  has  an  instinctive  contempt  for  the 
power  as  well  as  the  profession  of  letters,  —  is  utterly 
22 


338  STUPID    CONSERVATISM. 

blind  to  the  influence  of  literary  talent,  both  in  its  good 
and  its  perverted  exercise,  —  and  has  ever  done  its 
best  to  drive  needy  authors  to  that  perilous  point, 
where  they  are  compelled  to  choose  between  starva- 
tion and  the  prostitution  of  their  powers.  But  it  has 
done  even  more  than  to  stigmatize  authors  and  refuse 
its  patronage  to  their  works.  It  not  only  delights  to 
force  talent  into  discreditable  shifts  for  existence,  but 
it  furnishes  within  itself  the  social  abuses  on  which 
perverted  talent  bases  its  opposition  to  social  institu- 
tions. Thus  the  irruption  of  celebrated  murderers  and 
highwaymen  into  romance  might  be  traced  to  the 
abuses  of  English  criminal  law.  Stupid  conservatism 
treated  the  suspected  or  convicted  felon  with  unwise 
severity  ;  as  a  matter  of  course,  malignant  reform  lifted 
him  into  the  object  of  its  peculiar  interest  and  affection  ; 
and  then  nothing  was  left  for  the  novelist  to  do  but  to 
exalt  him  into  a  hero. 

Among  the  many  writers  belonging  to  this  Satanic 
and  sensual  school  of  romance,  there  are  doubtless 
some  whose  talents  are  brilliant,  and  whose  inten- 
tions are  not  consciously  bad.  "With  opinionated  un- 
derstandings directed  by  imbittered  sentiments,  they  are 
continually  mistaking  their  passionate  hatred  of  wrong 
for  an  impassioned  love  of  right,  and  their  pampered 
egotism  for  a  conscience  emancipated  from  prejudice. 


STUPID    CONSERVATISM.  339 

Deceived  by  their  own  sophistries,  they  take  a  moody 
delight  in  detaching  the  minds  of  their  readers  from  all 
those  institutions  in  which  morality  and  religion  are 
organized,  and  in  enticing  them  into  a  freer  region  of 
thought  and  action,  where  each  may  follow  out  his 
instincts  without  any  impertinent  intrusion  of  fear  or 
remorse,  —  two  emotions  which  are  apt  to  disturb  the 
equanimity  of  free  souls  in  actual  life.  Moral  princi- 
ples underlie,  animate,  and  shape  social  institutions ; 
the  power  and  life  of  those  principles  are  indicated  by 
their  having  sufficient  force  to  pass  out  of  abstractions 
into  things  ;  and,  as  far  as  regards  the  welfare  of  the 
generality  of  men,  an  assault  on  the  institutions  in 
which  morality  is  embodied  is  an  assault  on  moral 
principles.  However  imperfect  may  be  the  body  of 
institutions  in  which  morality  is  organized,  they  at  least 
recognize  the  truth  that  man  is  not  to  be  governed  by 
will  and  impulse,  but  by  law.  Now  the  leading  charac- 
teristic of  the  malignants  and  sentimentalists  of  romance 
is  the  denial  of  law  and  deification  of  impulse.  Every- 
thing is  brought  to  the  test  of  individual  will  or  individ- 
ual whim.  Their  system  excludes  the  ideas  of  truth, 
obedience,  self-denial,  and  the  like,  for  it  always  exalts 
the  subject  thinking  or  feeling  over  all  the  objects 
of  thought  and  emotion.  Thus  these  gentlemen  love 
truth ;  but  their  truth  is  ever  a  darling  paradox  of  their 


340  STUPID    CONSERVATISM. 

own  minds,  declining  the  authority  of  any  common 
standard,  and  therefore  nothing  but  a  subtle  egotism 
and  love  of  self.  The  same  principle  runs  through 
all  their  notions  of  virtue  and  excellence.  Disinterest- 
edness with  them  is  never  sacrifice  of  individual  com- 
fort for  the  benefit  of  others,  but  sacrifice  of  individual 
comfort  for  the  delights  of  individual  opinion.  The 
result  of  such  a  morbid  selfishness,  tricked  out  in  the 
most  flaring  sentimentalities  of  emotion  and  the  gaudi- 
est sophistries  of  thought,  is  to  make  obedience  to  self 
the  highest  virtue ;  and  thus  sensuality  and  wilfulness, 
the  lust  of  the  heart  and  the  lust  of  the  brain,  are 
practically  inculcated  as  the  proper  springs  of  conduct. 
Such  a  code  inevitably  brings  them  into  opposition  to 
all  the  concrete  morality  of  civilized  society,  for  the 
peculiar  excellence  of  that  morality  consists  in  its  being 
a  system  of  checks  equally  upon  the  caprices  of  thought 
and  passion.  In  order  to  make  their  opposition  pala- 
table, they  strive  to  pervert  the  natural  action  of  con- 
science ;  and  here  the  egotistic  character  of  their  sys- 
tem becomes  curiously  manifest,  for  conscience  with 
them  only  gives  a  certain  sacredness  to  selfishness,  and 
baptizes  their  passionate  impulses  as  inalienable  rights. 
Duty  is  lost  sight  of  except  as  an  underling  to  selfish- 
ness, —  a  man's  duty  consisting  in  battling  for  his  rights. 
In  this  the  romancers  have  altogether  distanced  the 


STUPID    CONSERVATISM.  341 

metaphysicians ;  for  the  austerest  of  transcendental 
thinkers  has  said  that  conscience  both  commands  and 
allows;  what  it  commands  is  duty,  what  it  allows  is 
right.  But  with  the  romancers,  conscience  is  the  mere 
pimp  of  passion,  allowing  everything,  and  command- 
ing U'a-to  obtain  everything  it  allows.  Their  theories, 
however,  are  principally  obnoxious  for  the  practical 
result  to  which  they  lead,  namely,  the  disconnection  of 
individual  conscience  from  institutions  in  which  the 
general  conscience  is  embodied.  The  conscience  of  a 
community  naturally  reposes  on  things,  is  educated 
and  sustained  by  institutions,  and  would  die  out  if  it 
had  no  other  sustenance  than  moral  opinions,  however 
elevated.  This  is  proved  by  the  readiness  with  which 
the  majority  of  men  give  way  to  sensual  excesses,  when 
the  restraints  of  civilized  society  are  withdrawn,  and 
"you  ought"  is  altogether  substituted  for  "you  shall." 
Those  persons  are  therefore  to  be  suspected  who,  on 
the  ground  that  institutions  are  imperfect,  would  substi- 
tute moral  theories  for  facts  and  things  which  embody 
morality.  Unless  their  characters  and  lives  are  obvi- 
ously higher  than  what  they  attack,  it  is  a  shrewd  con- 
jecture that  their  quarrel  with  institutions  is  on  account 
of  the  imperfection  of  their  evil,  rather  than  the  imper- 
fection of  their  good.  A  man  whose  notions  of  human 
rights  leads  him  to  call  property  theft  must  be  consid- 


342  STUPID    CONSERVATISM. 

ered  as  opposed  to  the  laws  which  protect  property, 
because  they  shackle  his  desire  to  thieve  rather  than 
his  power  to  bless  ;  and  a  romancer  who  prates  against 
the  institution  of  marriage  because  it  does  not  always 
unite  souls  commonly  ends  in  exalting  adultery  into  a 
virtue.  Indeed,  the  universal  process  of  the  malignants 
of  letters  is  dexterously  to  exaggerate  the  abuses  of 
social  institutions,  to  confound  abuses  with  uses,  and 
then  to  apply  a  rose-colored  theory  of  duty,  which 
dispenses  with  self-denial,  and  identifies  right  with 
pleasure.  Injustice  to  individuals  is  the  great  social 
wrong,  disorganization  of  society  is  their  great  social 
remedy ;  but  to  disorganize  is  to  deprave,  however 
seemingly  fine  may  be  the  sentiments  and  abstractly 
true  the  propositions,  on  which  the  disorganization  pro- 
ceeds. Society  is  really  improved  and  reformed  only 
by  communicating  to  it  a  higher  life,  —  a  life  which 
penetrates  into  its  organic  substance,  mixes  with  and 
modifies  its  inmost  spiritual  character,  and  there,  at  the 
heart  of  things,  creatively  shapes  new  forms,  or  puts 
new  vitality  into  old  ones.  Such  a  life,  it  is  true,  can 
never  proceed  from  a  stupid,  apathetic,  purblind  con- 
servatism, without  faith,  without  energy,  without  any- 
thing deserving  the  name  of  life  ;  but  neither  can  it  be 
communicated  by  morbid  and  acrid  spirits,  who  announce 
elevated  opinions  from  a  low  level  of  character,  and 


BTUPID   COXSERVATISM.  343 

whose  opposition  to  social  institutions  results  from  that 
good  element  in  them  which  checks  the  caprices  of 
their  self-will  and  bridles  their  aggressive  passions. 

These  hurried  remarks  on  a  prevailing  imposture  of 
the  day  have  occasionally,  we  fear,  betrayed  in  their 
style  of  expression  a  combination  of  the  dulness  of  the 
conservative  with  the  bitterness  of  the  reformer,  which 
vividly  exemplifies  the  faults  they  have  attacked.  We 
have  not  pretended,  however,  to  quarrel  with  any  sys- 
tem, conservative  or  philanthropic,  which  justifies  its 
adoption  of  the  name  by  illustrating  the  qualities  of  the 
thing,  but  simply  to  express  the  dislike  of  a  somewhat 
enraged  common  sense  against  two  forms  of  selfishness, 
the  apathetic  and  the  malignant,  which  now  strut  and 
bluster  as  the  chosen  champions  of  order  and  liberty. 
If  order  consists  in  social  stupidity  and  mental  death,  if 
liberty  be  nothing  more  than  the  triumph  of  malevolent 
mediocrity,  then  the  sooner  they  destroy  each  other, 
and  their  names  are  dismissed  from  the  dictionaries, 
the  better  it  will  be  for  all  that  is  real  in  order  and 
inspiring  in  liberty.  But  it  would  seem  that  their 
hostility  is  not  so  much  calculated  to  be  mutually 
destructive,  as  it  is  to  inflame  the  worst  qualities  of 
each.  The  men  who  stand  between  the  two,  in  a 
medium  position,  are  distinguished  for  the  moderation 
of  their  opinions  rather  than  for  possessing  the  life  of 


344  STUPID   CONSERVATISM. 

moderation,  and  they  therefore  have  little  influence  as 
positive  forces.  Vital  moderation  is  what  is  wanted; 
a  moderation  which  discerns  the  essential  relations  of 
things,  and  acts  in  accordance  with  its  insight,  —  a 
moderation  which  is  not  synonymous  with  common- 
place but  with  comprehensiveness.  Such  a  moderation 
would  be  too  austerely  just  and  too  broadly  intelli- 
gent, to  defend  existing  institutions  or  advance  benefi- 
cent reforms  on  any  other  principles  than  those  of  jus- 
tice and  intelligence ;  and  in  its  vigorous  grasp  of 
things,  and  comprehensive  discernment  of  relations,  it 
could  afford  to  dispense  with  that  rabble  of  resounding 
words  which  the  poisonous  vitality  of  opinionated  malev- 
olence has  now  almost  organized  into  a  vocabulary 
of  execration. 


THE   END. 


Cambridge :  Printed  by  Welch,  Bigelow,  &  Co. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

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